The Dark Pen of Success

A powerful and intense story
about the redemptive power of quality literature,
from an insider.

Amy Winston is a young, well-known book editor on a downward spiral. She drinks excessively and is unstable in her relationships. Although she has already made a name for herself and amassed untold wealth by turning a mediocre thriller writer into a famous and wealthy publishing star, her director assigns her the thankless task of guiding the exceptional writer Helen Owen to publish a commercially successful work.

When Amy visits Helen's beautiful home, she finds her and her husband, the acclaimed novelist Malcolm Taylor, in a silent state of war. The house was purchased with the enormous, seven-figure advance Helen received for the novel she wrote, in order to put an end to fifty years of enjoying rave reviews for her work but barely covering her family's expenses. It is a novel that Malcolm considers unworthy of her and for which he disrespects her. A novel that Helen is hesitant to submit, even though the deadline set by her publisher has passed. A novel that Amy has undertaken to "correct," facing an unprecedented challenge.

Helen and Malcolm are brilliant, great writers and they make Amy question herself, her path, and her choices, and wonder what is truly valuable.

And before she can realize it, the answer to these questions becomes a matter of life and death.