Lauren Ling Brown ’12 on Her Princeton-centric Thriller

On the latest PAW Book Club podcast, author Lauren Ling Brown ’12 answered questions about Society of Lies, her debut thriller — a murder mystery set on Princeton’s campus. The following excerpt has been edited and condensed. Listen to the full podcast and read the transcript at paw.princeton.edu/pawcasts.

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Rachel Marek ’17 asks, “What was it like creating a fictional eating club?”

It was fun, actually, because I had the freedom to really bring my own spin to what the eating club was, Sterling Club, which is what I called it in the book. It was a great place to explore this moral dilemma that I wanted for the main character, Maya, which was; If this secret society housed within a fictional eating club offered her a life of her dreams, the opportunity to have a successful career, have connections, take care of her younger sister — would she take that opportunity even when she learned that that new life came at the expense of someone else’s well-being, if that secret society was hurting someone else? That’s the moral dilemma and question that is really at the heart of the book, and that I think is really important. It’s exploring that gray area.

Tray Evarts ’90 asks, “Did anything inspire the idea of secret societies, like St. A’s?”

Oh, interesting. I read a lot of nonfiction books on secret societies, actually, not just at Princeton, but at Yale, and just secret societies throughout history. Those more inspired the secret society rather than any particular one at Princeton.

Karen Eschenlauer Macrae ’81 asks whether you or the University was “concerned about harm to the University’s reputation?”

That’s an interesting question, and while writing it, I didn’t think that I was portraying the University — I really tried my best not to portray the University in any sort of negative light, because I love Princeton and I want the best for the school. To me, this is very clearly a fictional story and a thriller, and there have been others, like Ninth House and The Rule of Four, set at different Ivies. I thought people would be used to seeing universities in a fictional thriller setting. So at once I tried to make sure that I did my best to portray Princeton as a good place, as not involved with this fictional Greystone Society, in the book, and also for the reader to hopefully realize that this is fiction, this is a thriller. It’s a commercial thriller.