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In Wally Lamb’s New Novel The River is Waiting, an Inmate Searches for Hope (People Exclusive)

By Carly Tagen-DyeCarly Tagen-Dye

Carly Tagen-Dye is the Books editorial assistant at PEOPLE, where she writes for both print and digital platforms.People Editorial Guidelines  Published on September 24, 2024 10:00AM EDT

The wait is over: Wally Lamb has a new novel coming.

The bestselling author of novels like She’s Come Undone and I Know This Much Is True is set to release his latest, The River is Waiting, next year through Marysue Rucci Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster — and PEOPLE has an exclusive excerpt.

The River is Waiting, Lamb’s first novel in eight years, follows Corby Ledbetter, a new father whose marriage is upended after he loses his job and finds himself harboring a secret addiction from his wife, Emily. When Corby is involved in a shocking tragedy, he is sentenced to prison and must adjust to an entirely new life.

Inside the correctional facility, however, Corby witnesses both acts of brutality and kindness, and forms bonds with the prison librarian, his cellmate and a troubled teenager in need of a role model. Through his fellow inmates and his mother’s belief in him, Corby comes to see that he may still be able to find redemption, per the book’s description.

Lamb has a personal connection to the book’s subject matter. The author established a creative writing program at the York Correctional Institution, a women’s correctional facility in Connecticut where he has volunteered for 20 years. Lamb is also the editor of the essay volumes Couldn’t Keep It Myself and I’ll Fly Away, which is composed of writing from his students.

Read on for an exclusive excerpt from The River is Waiting.

It’s six a.m. and I’m the first one up. Spotify’s playing that Chainsmokers song I like. If we go down, then we go down together … I take an Ativan and chase my morning coffee with a couple of splashes of 100-proof Captain Morgan. I return the bottle to its hiding place inside the 20-quart lobster pot we never use, put the lid on, and put it back in the cabinet above the fridge that Emily can’t reach without the step stool. Then I fill the twins’ sippy cups and start making French toast for breakfast. If we go down, then we go down together. I cut the music so I can listen for the kids, but that song’s probably going to play in my head all morning.

Emily’s up now and in the bathroom, getting ready for work. When the shower stops, I hear the twins babbling to each other in the nursery we converted from my studio almost two years ago. My easel, canvases and paints had been exiled to the space behind the basement stairs. It wasn’t much of a sacrifice. I made my living as a commercial artist and had been struggling after hours and on weekends to make “serious” art, but after the babies were born, the last thing I felt like doing was staring at a blank canvas and waiting for some abstraction to move from my brain down my arm to my brush to see what came out.

Maisie was the alpha twin; Niko, who would learn to creep, walk and say words after his sister did, was the beta. In the developmental race, Niko always came in second, but, as their personalities began to emerge, his sister became our more serious, more driven twin and he was our mischievous little laughing boy. I loved them more deeply every day for who each was becoming. How could some artistic indulgence of mine have competed with what our lovemaking had created? It wasn’t even close.

“Yoo-hoo, peekaboo!” I call in to them, playing now-you-see-me-now­ you-don’t at the doorway into their room. “Daddy!” they say simultaneously. Their delight at seeing me fills me with momentary joy-my elation aided, I guess, by the benzo and booze. I lift them, one after the other, out of the crib they share. The twins often hold on to each other as they sleep and sometimes even suck each other’s thumb. 

By the time Emily comes into the kitchen, I’ve already put her coffee and a stack of French toast on the table, the older pieces on the bottom and the fresh slices I’d made to replace the burnt ones on top. “Mama!” Niko shouts. Emily kisses the top of his head. “How’s my favorite boy today?” she asks. Then, turning to his sister, she kisses her head, too, and says, ”And how’s my favorite girl?” She loves both of our kids, of course, but she favors Niko, whose emerging personality is like mine. Maisie is clearly her mother’s daughter. She’s less silly, more self-sufficient. Niko and I are the needy ones.

Excerpted from The River is Waiting: A Novel by Wally Lamb. Copyright © 2025 by Wally Lamb. Reprinted by permission of Marysue Rucci Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, LLC.

The River is Waiting will be published on May 6, 2025 and is now available for preorder, wherever books are sold.

She’s Come Undone among Simon & Shuster’s Top 100 Notable Books

In celebration of their 100-year anniversary, Simon & Schuster Publishers has selected a list of 100 notable books over the years, including The Great Gatsby, A Farewell to Arms, Catch 22, Lonesome Dove, and Angela’s Ashes. What a thrill to find She’s Come Undone, Wally’s first novel, included on the list! Thank you, Simon & Schuster!

Wally Lamb Featured on Upcoming Episode

I’m excited to be included in the latest season of About The Authors TV SEASONS 7 & 8.

Check out the trailer below which features over 100 authors and spans every genre and generation. These seasons will be released in the late Spring 2024 on TUBI TV, the streaming network that airs the show.

Wally Lamb to Read at the Saratoga Book Festival in October

The Saratoga Book Festival is an annual community-wide celebration of books in downtown Saratoga Springs, New York. Save the Date! On October 13-15, 2023, the Friends of the Saratoga Springs Public Library once again presents the annual Saratoga Book Festival. The three-day festival features big-stage presentations and intimate conversations with acclaimed writers. In all, more than 25 different festival events will take place over the three-day weekend in more than six venues in Saratoga’s historic and walkable downtown, including the Saratoga City Center (the site of the Festival Hub and the SBF lively Literary Marketplace), the Saratoga Springs Public Library, Caffe Lena, UPH/Proctors, the Saratoga Arts Dee Sarno Theatre, and a few very welcoming nearby pubs. The home of Yaddo, the famed artist retreat, three fantastic bookstores, two colleges, and a vibrant writing culture, Saratoga Springs is a perfect place for residents and visitors alike to meet authors and talk about books, great writing, and big ideas.

Most Saratoga Book Festival events will once again be FREE and open to the public. Keynote Sessions will have a small admission fee. All events take place in downtown Saratoga Springs. please visit the festival’s website at https://saratogabookfestival.org

Wally Lamb to Read at CT Lit Fest October 14th

The Fest takes over the galleries of Real Art Ways for readings, talks, performances, and an interactive typewriter installation. The main gallery hosts a bookfair to showcase publishers, journals, writing programs, and arts organizations.

Featured writers will include Wally Lamb and Antoinette Brim-Bell, also featuring Victoria Buitron, Sean Frederick Forbes, Catina Bacote, Steve Ostrowski, Frederick-Douglass Knowles II, Lara Ehrlich Margaret Gibson, Julien Strong, José B. Gonzalez, Hirsh Sawhney, Janae Marks, Susan Campbell, Sarah Darer Littman, Natasha Grambell, Bessy Reyna, and Ryan Parker, plus readers from the 2023 CT Literary Anthology and a live recording of Writer Mother Monster Podcast.

Events run throughout the day. Admission is free.

Wally Lamb to Represent Connecticut in Documentary Film: Books Across America

Author and filmmaker Mason Engel traveled to 50 states, read 50 books by 50 different authors to explore how books fit into the modern media landscape — all in 50 days! Mason and Wally met at Bank Square Books in New London to talk about his novel I’ll Take You There.

Check out the trailer for the soon-to-be released film: https://fb.watch/lCW2u5fJJ_/

Wally Lamb to Appear On “About the Authors TV”

ABOUT THE AUTHORS TV is a 1st-of-its-kind streaming talk show w/host Jake Brown interviewing the world’s BEST-SELLING authors. Jake interviews Wally about writing his 2008 New York Times Bestseller, The Hour I First Believed. Here’s a short promo of the interview which will be released soon on Jake Brown’s YouTube channel.

Wally Lamb named 2023 Norwich Native Son

The Norwich Rotary Clubs and the Norwich Woman’s City Club are proud to announce the 2023 Norwich Native Son is author Wally Lamb.

Lamb is the author of six bestselling novels. His first and second novels, She’s Come Undone and I Know This Much Is True, were Oprah’s Book Club selections and number one New York Times bestsellers. I Know This Much Is True was adapted as an HBO limited series starring Mark Ruffalo and Lamb’s fourth novel, Wishin’ and Hopin’, was the basis of a Lifetime TV Christmas movie of the same name. Several of Lamb’s novels are set in the fictional town of Three Rivers, Connecticut, loosely based on his hometown of Norwich. Together, Lamb’s novels have been translated into 17 languages.

Lamb is also the editor of Couldn’t Keep It to Myself, I’ll Fly Away, and You Don’t Know Me, three volumes of autobiographical essays authored by his writing workshop students at York Correctional Institute, Connecticut’s maximum-security women’s prison. In 2004, the workshop and the first of these titles was the focus of a story on CBS-TV’s Sixty Minutes. Lamb volunteered at York from 1999 to 2019. Before that, he taught at the Norwich Free Academy (1972 to 1997) and ran the Creative Writing department at UConn from 1997 to 1999.

Honors for Wally Lamb include a National Endowment for the Arts grant, the Barnes and Noble “Writers for Writers” Award, the New England Book Award, the Friends of the Library USA Readers’ Choice Award, the Connecticut Bar Association’s Distinguished Public Service Award, and Distinguished Alumni awards from the University of Connecticut and Vermont College. Wally Lamb was honored to be chosen as NFA’s first Teacher of the Year in 1989.

Lamb holds Bachelors and Masters Degrees from UConn and a graduate degree from Vermont College of the Fine Arts. He is forever grateful for the education he received at the following Norwich schools: Broad Street and Buckingham Schools, Kelly Middle School (then Kelly Junior High), and the Norwich Free Academy.

As this year’s Native Son-Daughter recipient, Wally is pleased to join the ranks of past honorees: his cousin, Dr. Frank Pedace (1981), his fellow 1968 NFA graduates, Pete Slosberg (2001) and Dr. Mike Morosky (2017), and his former NFA student, Judge Nina Elgo (2015.)

Lamb will be honored at a luncheon on June 7th, 2023 at the Holiday Inn, Norwich. The event will start at noon, and tickets are available here.

Garde Arts Center Presents ‘I Know This Much is True’ Series

The Garde Arts Center is pleased to announce that Connecticut-based novelist Wally Lamb will host screenings of the entire six-episode HBO series, I Know This Much Is True, over three nights from September 21 to 23, 2022 at 7 p.m. on the Garde’s giant movie screen. On Thursday and Friday nights, Director Derek Cianfrance and actor Mark Ruffalo will join Lamb to host post-show discussions.

Tickets to each night range from $24-48 per person and are available at gardearts.org. 
 
I Know This Much Is True is an adaptation of the New York Times bestseller and award-winning novel by Norwich, CT, native Wally Lamb. In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic canceled the premiere screening of the HBO limited series. The Garde is pleased to offer the first theater screening of the entire series, which follows the parallel lives of identical twin brothers played by three-time Oscar nominee Mark Ruffalo, in an epic story of betrayal, sacrifice, and forgiveness. The story is set against the backdrop of 20th-century America, inspired by the communities and characters of eastern Connecticut that have influenced much of Lamb’s work over the years. Ruffalo won an Emmy, Golden Globe, and Screen Actors Guild award for his performance in I Know This Much Is True. The series is rated TV-MA and is intended for adults (Mature Audience; may be unsuitable for children under 17).
 
Tickets for episodes 1 & 2 on Sept. 21 are $24, and tickets for Sept. 22 and 23 are $48 each. Patrons who purchase tickets to all three nights and use promo code IKTMIT at checkout on gardearts.org will receive a 25% discount.  Each episode runs about an hour, and will be followed by live discussions with our hosts.  Doors open at 6 p.m.
 
Visit https://gardearts.org/events/i-know-this-much-is-true-12/ for more information and tickets, or call the Garde box office at 860-444-7373 x1 Mon-Fri 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

2nd Annual Albany Film Festival

The Albany Film Festival differs from most film festivals, which are usually multi-day events at various locations around a city. This is a very story-focused festival, with conversations about filmmakers as storytellers, book-to-film, writing vs. visual storytelling, screenwriting, criticism, and film history and biography. The emphasis is more on conversation and Q&A with guests than on screenings of full films.

The 2nd Annual Albany Film Festival – featuring a number of “bookish” events, and events that emphasize writing – will be presented by the NYS Writers Institute on Saturday, April 2, 2022, at the University at Albany.

A highlight of this year’s festival will include a conversation between bestselling novelist Wally Lamb and acclaimed director Derek Cianfrance about his adaptation of Lamb’s novel, I Know This Much Is True. Based on the bestselling novel by Wally Lamb, written and directed by Derek Cianfrance, and starring Mark Ruffalo, this limited series follows Dominick Birdsey as he struggles to care for his twin brother, Thomas, while discovering the truth about his own family history. Ruffalo won a Primetime Emmy Award and a Golden Globe for best actor for his role, aired on HBO and shot partly in Ulster and Dutchess counties.

Screening and discussion with director Derek M. Cianfrance and author Wally Lamb 1 p.m. – 2 p.m., Screening, Campus Center West Auditorium

The event, free and open to the public, will take place on UAlbany’s Uptown Campus, 1400 Washington Avenue, Albany. Maps, free parking locations, and more information available at https://www.albanyfilmfestival.org/