What is the title of your latest release?
THE OTHELLO CLUB
What’s the “elevator pitch” for your new book?
Six strangers at a divorce therapy group plan to get payback on their cheating exes, but one of them takes it too far.
How did you decide where your book was going to take place?
Divorce, heartbreak, jealousy and revenge are universal, transcending culture and geography. I could have set this story anywhere, but I chose London. It’s a city I’ve worked in for two decades, and its cultural and economic diversity mirrors my characters’ disparate, and desperate lives. A melting pot on the verge of boiling over.
Would you hang out with your heroine in real life?
I’d love to hang out with Emily. Though only if it doesn’t involve a competitive activity. Like her, I’m a terrible loser.
What are three words that describe your hero?
Tenacious. Resourceful. Uncompromising.
What’s something you learned while writing this book?
Having interviewed many divorcees during my research, I learned the only (healthy) way to move past a traumatic breakup is through acceptance and forgiveness. Sadly, not everyone is capable of that. Especially the characters in The Othello Club, who instead choose anger and revenge. Ultimately, a path of mutual destruction.
Do you edit as you draft or wait until you are totally done?
Frustratingly, I can’t resist editing as I go. I know it slows me down, especially since I’ll rewrite later anyway, but old habits die hard. Maybe next time I’ll manage to just power through… probably not.
What’s your favorite foodie indulgence?
Lobster linguine! The butterier, creamier and more calorific, the better! My death row meal.
Describe your writing space/office!
I write in my study. A euphemism for the box room, the smallest room in the house. Surrounded by shelves groaning with books and collected artefacts, it can sometimes feel claustrophobic, particularly when the writing isn’t flowing. Milo, my flatulent Patterjack terrier, often joins me, so I also keep a ready supply of air freshener.
Who is an author you admire?
Thomas Harris was a revelation for me. The Silence of the Lambs remains my archetypal crime thriller. If there’s a better book in the genre, I’m still waiting to find it. Recommendations are welcome.
Is there a book that changed your life?
Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea. I first read it at 20, on a beach in Greece beside my girlfriend, now my wife. A beautiful paean to the struggles of aging and the resilience of the human spirit, and more profound each time I revisit it. It taught me that whatever stage of life you’re in, live it to the fullest.
Tell us about when you got “the call.” (when you found out your book was going to be published). Or, for indie authors, when you decided to self-publish.
When my agent emailed me about The Othello Club’s acceptance, I braced for the usual rejection. Reading the opposite felt seismic. Like a rapture of shock and joy. A moment that still reverberates. There have been other highs on my writing journey: signing with my agent, hearing Paramount+ had green-lit the TV adaptation. But finding out I’d be a published author, of a book I'm proud to have written, almost matched the emotion of my wedding day, or the birth of my children.
What’s your favorite genre to read?
Crime thrillers. In the truest sense of the term.
What’s your favorite movie?
Impossible to pick one, but David Fincher’s Seven is unmatched. Concept, writing, casting, direction, it’s flawless. Thirty years later, that ending still haunts me. It taught me that stories, like life, don’t need a Hollywood ending, and are often better for it.
What is your favorite season?
Summer! Does anyone ever say winter? Except for writers of Christmas novels.
How do you like to celebrate your birthday?
Dinner with my family. A local restaurant, so nobody needs to drive. Then afterwards we can all amble home, a little heavier, tipsier and happier.
What’s a recent TV show/movie/book/podcast you highly recommend?
I was lucky enough to get a proof copy of M.K. Oliver’s A Sociopath’s Guide to a Successful Marriage, which blew me away. One of the funniest, most brilliant books I’ve read. It’s coming out in February next year. I defy anyone not to love it.
What’s your favorite type of cuisine?
I alluded to it earlier with my love of pasta. Italian all the way!
What do you do when you have free time?
Writing occupies most of my free time outside my full-time job. When I’m not writing, I enjoy running. Partly to offset my pasta habit, but it’s also great for writing. I’ve solved many a plot problem on a morning run.
What can readers expect from you next?
I’ve nearly finished a new novel I’m excited about. Maybe it’ll be the next book. Or, depending on how THE OTHELLO CLUB and its TV adaptation fare, perhaps a sequel. I do like a good cliffhanger…
Six divorcees seek revenge on their deceitful spouses, but someone starts taking it much too far…
Emily had the perfect life – the perfect job, the perfect house, the perfect husband – before she was blindsided and betrayed and lost it all. Now she's sitting in a divorce counselling group wondering how she’ll ever feel okay again. What she wants is her old life back, and these group sessions seem to be the only way she'll be able to move on – past the jealousy, the hurt, and the daydreams of getting revenge.
And it seems everyone in the group is in the same boat: jilted by an ex-partner and struggling to cope. So over post-therapy drinks, the six divorcées come up with the brilliant idea to get a little payback of their own – Strangers-on-a-Train style, with each getting even on another's behalf. Nothing serious – just enough to disrupt their former partner's picture-perfect lives.
Emily is hesitant at first, but the more her old life spins away from her, the less she worries about her morals – plus, they agreed no one would get hurt.
But just when the group think they've pulled off the perfect petty crimes, one of the exes is found dead… and then another… and another…
With DI Rosa Hawkes on their case and the plan spiralling out of control, Emily doesn't know who she can trust, and if divorce taught her anything, it’s that you can’t trust anyone, even the people you love. Especially the people you love. Let alone perfect strangers like these.
Thriller Crime [Watkins Publishing, On Sale: October 14, 2025, Trade Paperback / e-Book, ISBN: 9781917415125 / eISBN: 9781917415132]
J.D. Pennington is an award-winning creative director and copywriter with over twenty years of experience in film and television advertising, creating campaigns for major studios and leading independents.
A native of Merseyside, he lives in Hertfordshire, United Kingdom, with his wife, two children and a mischievous Patterjack terrier. The Othello Club is his first novel. It has been developed and adapted for television by Gaumont for Paramount+, and is currently filming.
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