A passion for reading and books always came naturally to me, until it didn't.
In high school, I was in all advanced placement classes, which meant lots of extra boring reading, and I had a 10th grade English teacher who treated me like garbage because my grandmother was friends with her ex-mother-in-law. By the time I'd spent a year or two in college, I was so burned out on reading stuff I didn't want to read that I lost my desire to do so recreationally.
And then I got a job in a book store. One dreary September day, while I was still in college and studying acting on the side, I knew I needed more financial help to support all of my endeavors beyond just babysitting and working part-time in a daycare. So, I dragged myself to the local mall and filled out a bunch of applications.
I got callbacks from TGI Fridays and Borders. When I learned that working at TGI Fridays would include singing, wearing silly "flair," and not being clumsy, something at which I do not excel, I opted for Borders and never looked back. I hated retail, but I stayed there for about three years, and it's really one of my favorite jobs I've ever had. I worked with an interesting mix of people, some of whom I'm still friends with to this day, and there's something about spending 30 to 40 or so hours a week surrounded by books that's just downright whimsical.
There was only one problem: As much as I loved books, I still recoiled at the idea of sitting down to read one. Every other Friday, when we got paid, I'd watch some of my coworkers line up at the register with a stack of books they'd hoarded for the last two weeks — we got an amazing employee discount — and I felt kind of left out. Until one day a girl named Jessica helped me. She asked me what I liked to read, and I confessed that I didn't know anymore. She and I had gone to high school together, though we were a year apart and weren't really friends, but she had some ideas about me. Also, we'd been working together for a month or two, and she'd sized me up. We seemed to have a lot in common.
Jessica took me through the store and filled my hands with books that she'd fallen in love with over the last few years. "Start with these," she said. I can't remember what all was in that pile, but I do remember three very distinct titles that I still cherish to this day. The first was Jemima J. by Jane Green, and the second was Good in Bed by Jennifer Weiner. The third was Confessions of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella.
I took them home and devoured them. They had bright, shiny, colorful covers with high heels, designer purses, and cocktail glasses on them that screamed "buy me and read me" to a young girly girl such as myself at the time who was just entering adulthood. They were snarky and sassy and fun, but they were also relatable. Before I knew it, I was reading "chick lit" faster than I could get my hands on it.
Those three authors were like the godmothers of a whole genre of books that young millennials fell in love with during the 2000s. I can't speak for everyone, but they — with Jessica's help — helped me rediscover my passion for reading. I'd also argue that they shaped my own writing, both fiction and nonfiction, more than almost anything else.
They taught me that you can tell a story without being stiff or formal — that you can tell stories in a way that is conversational, honest, and a little messy, like two friends gossiping over brunch. Even today, I get a lot of nice comments and emails from our readers, thanking me for writing about foreign policy in a way that humanizes it and makes it digestible. While I appreciate that, I can't take credit for it. I learned it from these amazing women. I've been writing and telling stories since I was old enough to hold a pencil, but they helped me find my voice.
When I woke up this morning, I saw that Kinsella — whose real name is Madeleine Sophie Wickham — died today. She was only 55. In 2022, she found out that she had brain cancer, glioblastoma, and in 2024, she made the news public.
Her family, which includes her husband, four sons, and a daughter, announced on social media today that "she died peacefully, with her final days filled with her true loves: family and music and warmth and Christmas and joy."
They added: "Despite her illness, which she bore with unimaginable courage, Sophie counted herself truly blessed — to have such wonderful family and friends, and to have had the extraordinary success of her writing career. She took nothing for granted and was forever grateful for the love she received."
She'd written dozens of books — I'll admit that I haven't read any of the more recent ones — and in 2025, the British Book Awards declared her the "Author of the Year." In 2024, her novel What Does It Feel Like was selected as one of the New York Times' 100 Notable Books of the Year. It was an autobiographical story about a woman who was dealing with her own brain cancer diagnosis.
While I haven't read any of her books in years, seeing her obituary land in my inbox this morning felt like a punch in the gut, but it also made me nostalgic for those days at Borders. I knew I wanted to write something about her, but given that our PJM audience is most definitely not made up of millennial women, I knew that many of you would probably have no idea who she is and wouldn't care. Even so, I still couldn't let the day go by without acknowledging what her life meant to me.
I've made a living as a writer for the last 13 years. Without Sophie, there'd be no Sarah. I'm almost certain of it. And I can't be grateful enough for that. Rest in peace.
