Media and Praise | Fran Hawthorne

"...complex, evocative and nuanced....the richly-drawn characters in I Meant To Tell You are both wholly human and wholly believable; humor and pathos seamlessly intertwine in this resonant and revealing narrative" — The Indypendent newspaper, September 25, 2022

“Fran Hawthorne delivers a nuanced exploration of the connections among women – and how they can unravel when lies of omission are revealed… I Meant to Tell You kept me turning the pages late into the night.” —Jennifer Coburn, USA Today best-selling author of Cradles of the Reich

“Fran Hawthorne has written a wise, kind, and above all compassionate novel about the secrets we keep and the judgments we make.” —Yona Zeldis McDonough, Fiction Editor of Lilith

"The writing is lovely, with strong analogies and memorable voices... (The novel) pushes the reader to question which type of secrets are valid to keep and why."--Story Circle Network, January 25, 2023

"The story remains upbeat and it is a fairly quick read, but provides food for thought. It would be a terrific book club pick." —The Rose City Reader, November 30, 2022

“I Meant to Tell You opens with a white lie, a small dishonesty. But it widens to reveal that the people we think we know may all be hiding behind convenient mistruths. In that way it is a compelling portrait of our times, stuffed with richly drawn characters and alive with sharp and glimmering prose. A literary page-turner.” —Brian Castleberry, author of Nine Shiny Objects (long-listed for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction)

The novel's "many twists and turns ... managed to be surprising and moving, leaving readers caring more about the characters than they might expect." -- The Reporter (the newspaper of the Jewish Federation of Greater Binghamton, NY), May 4, 2023

“An absorbing, beautifully told story about how tenaciously we hang onto family myths --and how, once one secret is revealed, other truths come into the light.” —Janice Steinberg, author of The Tin Horse (winner, San Diego Book Award)