8 Books To Read If You’re Suddenly Nostalgic For Inter-Office Drama

My favorite kind of books center on close-knit groups whose lives become enmeshed and whose secrets and agendas get all bunched up and tangled. That's why the office (remember that place???), where everyone: work wives, frenemies, rivals, crushes, secret hookups, are forced into the same room five days a week? Now that is a crucible for interpersonal drama.

That’s why I set my sophomore thriller, The Herd (out 3/24), in an exclusive all-female co-working space in New York City. The Herd (emphasis on the H-E-R) is upended when Eleanor, its beautiful and enigmatic founder, disappears the night of a glitzy press conference, leaving her three best-friends-slash-coworkers scrambling to find her, before they lose their careers, their friendships... and maybe even their lives.

The bougie startup isn’t just an interesting social milieu; it’s also a hotbed of female ambition, where everyone is walking the line between being a beloved team player and standing out from the pack. And that’s the final reason I love office-drama novels — we’re supposed to present the best versions of ourselves at our 9-to-5, but there’s an inherent tension between the company’s best interest and our own.

Here, eight novels that show you should keep your friends close... but your coworkers even closer.