The Latecomers Fan Club

IndieReader Discovery Award Winner for Chick Lit 2014!

"An often entertaining novel about how life can turn out when careers and marriages don't happen as planned." --Kirkus Reviews

What is it about musicians that makes them so irresistible? If Abby and Maggie could answer that question, maybe they could finally get over Nathaniel.

Abby was first sucked in by Nathaniel's rock and roll swagger four years ago when a drunken fling turned into a series of drunken hook-ups that became something like a relationship. Now, as New Year's Eve promises a fresh start, she wants to believe he's finally going to grow up and take their relationship seriously.

What does Nathaniel hope the New Year will bring? An escape from reality. He's thirty-four years old and he's barely making ends meet as an adjunct philosophy professor, which was always only a backup plan anyway. Nathaniel's real goal was always to make his living as a musician, but his band, The Latecomers, broke up a couple of years ago, and he hasn't picked up his guitar in months. When he decides to spend the holiday with some high school friends instead of hanging out at the bar where Abby works, he gets the happy surprise of reuniting with his long-lost friend Maggie. Newly divorced, Maggie has just moved back to her mother's house to regroup.

Nathaniel and Maggie were supposed to be the ones who left central Massachusetts forever to conquer the world. He was going to be a rock star. She was going to take the world of art by storm. He's never gotten farther than Boston, and her best efforts only left her broke and heartbroken. As they ring in the New Year together, Nathaniel decides it's time to take control of his life and to start making his dreams come true. He thinks the first step will be easy. All he needs to do is break up with Abby and finally admit his feelings for Maggie. But the New Year has more surprises in store, and nothing is ever as simple as it seems.

Diane Vanaskie Mulligan began writing her first novel, Watch Me Disappear, during an after-school writing club she moderates for high school students. She published it in August 2012. In 2013, it was a finalist in the Kindle Book Review's Best Indie Book Awards in the Young Adult category. Her second novel, The Latecomers Fan Club, was released in November 2013. It was named a 2014 IndieReader Discovery Award winner.

Diane holds a BA in American Studies from Mount Holyoke College and a Master’s degree in teaching from Simmons College. When she isn’t teaching or writing, she’s the managing editor at The Worcester Review and the director of The Betty Curtis Worcester County Young Writers’ Conference You can also find her occasionally strumming her guitar and singing at various bars in central Massachusetts, where she lives with her husband.