Welcome! Will is the author of the novel Obedience, published by Shaye Areheart Books (hardcover) and Three Rivers Press (paperback), a psychological thriller about a group of college students who find that their class assignment could have deadly consequences.
Latest News
- My second novel, Dominance, was just picked up by Shaye Areheart Books! I’m working to finish the manuscript as we speak. Stay tuned for any news on Dominance or Obedience, and feel free to contact me at willrlavender@gmail.com.
- Obedience was a bestseller in Taiwan for more than six months; I’ve been told that it was the bestselling mystery title in 2008. Thanks to Gray Tan at the Grayhawk Agency and everyone who helped the book become a success in China. Gum xia hokkien!
- Obedience has now been published in at least nine foreign countries, with more to come. Just received my (red covered!) book from Piemme in Italy. The book has also appeared from Pan Macmillan in England, from Bruna in Holland (translated title: The Hidden Riddle), from Michel Lafon in France, from Faces in Taiwan (translated title: roughly Logic Class Goes Mad), from Random House Mondadori in Spain (translated title: The Guardian of the Game), and from Damm in Sweden. It’s forthcoming in Russia, Portugal, Romania and a few other places in the world. Thank you to all the overseas editors and agents who made this possible.
- Obedience is a New York Times Bestseller!
- Crimesquad says, “As a fan, reading–and reviewing–many, many crime novels it is a pleasure to discover a book that goes out of its way to try something different and really make the reader think. Will Lavender has done this.”
- The Sacramento News and Review calls Obedience “chilling, unpredictable…As much ghost story as…a delicious mystery.”
- Salon.com says, “Obedience is a full course-load of sinister fun.”
- Please check the blog for book, movie, and music recommendations. If you want to see what inspires me, then it’s all in the blog.
- The music and books blog “Largehearted Boy” has posted my essay on the music that inspired Obedience.
- The New York Daily News says that Obedience is “quite a twisty tale…Haunting…Irresistible.”
- The St. Petersburg Times says that Obedience is a “terrific debut…A wonderful book with an emotional punch at the end.”
- Marshal Zerinque has a pretty cool project caled “The Page 69 Test.” I ran Obedience through the test, and you can see the results here.
- The Wall Street Journal calls Obedience “evidence that crime fiction is hardly a played-out genre…A mystery as ambitious as one could imagine.”
- The New York Times Book Review says, ”It’s a genuine, if slightly perverse, kick to follow every byzantine clue in this bizarre game. If you solve this one without peeking at the last chapter, it’s an automatic A.”
- The Tampa Bay Tribune says, “Lavender’s first novel suggests he has a bright future. Obedience builds to a swirling conclusion.”
- The Louisville Courier-Journal says “Will Lavender stuns with this compelling thriller…I came away with the feeling that I had discovered a new master of the genre.”
- Louisville’s Velocity Weekly has a great story about me and Obedience here. Of all the things that have been written and said about this book, I think I’m most proud of this Joanna Richards piece.
- Bookreporter.com has a nice interview with me here.
- See my interview with Fox in the Morning here.
- Obedience was a Book-of-the-Month Club, a Doubleday Book Club, a Literary Guild, a Mystery Guild, and an InsightOut Book Club featured alternate.
- Bookgasm.com calls Obedience “a fiendishly clever thriller…Alfred Hitchcock would’ve snapped up the rights to this like a plate of veal.”
- Bookreporter.com calls Obedience an “infuriating, brilliant puzzle…[An] intriguing and addicting psychological thriller from a talented new writer worthy of our undivided attention.”
- The Edmonton Journal calls Obedience “the most gripping book of this or any other year.”
Obedience Reviews
“[Lavender] gets his hooks in deep with this arresting debut… An inspired thriller about cognitive dissonance, conjectural misdirection and the conspicuous dichotomy between academia and the real world.”—Kirkus Reviews
“A devilishly inventive debut that reads like a house of mirrors. Nothing is what it seems, right up to the devastating finale.”—Brian Freeman author of Stripped and Immoral
“Obedience is a very scary story set on the border where good meets evil, located in this case in that scariest of places, academia. Taut, twisty, and highly original: the pages turned themselves.”—Peter Abrahams author of Oblivion and The Fan
“A taut, clever puzzle, so artfully crafted and tightly wound that it springs open its trap when you least expect it to.”—Carol Goodman author of The Sonnet Lover and The Lake of Dead Languages
