Marissa Stapley’s book Lucky became an international bestseller after it was picked to be a part of actress Reese Witherspoon's book club.Dahlia Katz/Supplied
In August, 2021, Marissa Stapley’s agent and editor invited her out to dinner to celebrate her fourth book, Lucky, about a young con-woman on the run. Stapley was 42 at the time, a married mother of two teenagers, a Toronto-based journalist and novelist who was proud to be a Canadian bestseller but also understood that those numbers don’t necessarily translate into fame or big bucks. Nor did her side gig, writing holiday rom-coms under a pen name.
When Stapley arrived at the restaurant, champagne was on the table, and her editor revealed a life-changing secret: Reese Witherspoon’s book club had chosen Lucky as its December pick, the first Canadian novel to make that cut. Witherspoon’s production company, Hello Sunshine, thought it could be a killer TV series, too. (They were right: Lucky, starring Anya Taylor-Joy and Annette Bening, arrives on Apple TV July 15.)
Stapley burst into tears. She’d worked hard on all her books, but Lucky was particularly close to her heart. In 2019, her mother, now deceased, had been diagnosed with incurable colon cancer; Stapley wanted to suspend work to spend time with her, travelling back and forth between Toronto and Markham by bus. But her mother had other ideas.
“My mother was a velvet hammer, soft and lovely but no guff,” Stapley recalled in a recent video interview from her cottage in Haliburton. “She said, ‘I will not have my illness derail your career. Find something to write.’”
Always listen to your mother. On one of those bus rides, Stapley was thinking about lottery ticket winners, “and it was as if Lucky just sat down beside me and introduced herself,” she says. Instantly, Stapley knew her: Lucky Armstrong, evading both the FBI and the mob, a winning lottery ticket pinned inside her shirt.
In Stapley’s notebook from that time, pages of Lucky notes alternate with pages of notes about her mother’s care. Her mom read the book as Stapley wrote it, a welcome distraction for them both, “like Lucky was conning us into forgetting that my mom was going to die.” Now for Stapley, the book is forever tied to her mother’s strength and resilience.
Witherspoon didn’t know Lucky’s backstory when she chose the book, but she’s partial to women heroines who overcome obstacles. She also believes that success is meaningless if you hoard it all for yourself; you have to pay it forward. “She’s Reese Witherspoon, I’m not going to say we’re best friends,” Stapley says with a laugh, “but we have spent some time together now, and I can really see it gives her joy to make things happen for female storytellers.”
With the bump from Reese’s Book Club, Lucky became an international bestseller, Stapley’s other novels have been optioned or reoptioned – including Three Holidays and a Wedding, by Netflix – and she was able to realize her life-long dream of buying a cottage.
She and her family also visited the set of the series, where they watched an elaborate car-flip stunt that took a full day to film. (“The stunt co-ordinator is Eric Norris, Chuck Norris’s son – how cool is that?” Stapley enthuses. She also plays the show’s opening song, by Fiona Apple, on repeat.)
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Hanging out in the makeup trailer with Bening, petting Drew Starkey’s Pomeranian (he plays Cary, Lucky’s dubious boyfriend), having Taylor-Joy throw her arms around her and ask, “Did you manifest me?” – that was thrilling, Stapley says. “But more than that, seeing hundreds of people working because of a character I created, I felt such a sense of joy. Hollywood is hard, publishing is hard. Being able to put something out in the universe where people are able to pay their bills because of me, it’s the most rewarding career experience I’ve ever had.”
Fans of the novel are in for a leaner, more propulsive ride in the series – the showrunner, Jonathan Tropper (Your Friends and Neighbors), told Stapley he wanted to “throw all the characters into boiling water.” But the spirit of the book, the high-octane family drama among Lucky (Taylor-Joy), her father John (Timothy Olyphant) and her de facto mother-in-law Priscilla (Bening) remains. Stapley is especially delighted by Bening’s take on Priscilla, “her cool glasses and great suits, and Annette’s dark, unhinged maternal energy. Priscilla has been carrying water for the patriarchy for a long time, so to see her turn that around – more of that, please.”
Resistance to patriarchy runs through many of Stapley’s novels, including her most nineties-era singer/songwriters loosely inspired by Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love. Woven through her tales of “family dynamics, redemption and what we owe the world” are trenchant observations of inequity: How a man does a woman wrong, yet she has to manage his feelings about it. How it feels easier to the world if the woman is the problematic partner, and how “problematic” can be as simple as defending yourself or not smiling enough.
She wrote The Last Resort (2019), about a charismatic evangelical cult leader, in a fit of rage after Donald Trump was first elected U.S. president. “But I get nervous about seeming too angry,” she says. “You have to couch the rage in a great story: ‘Oh by the way, you should realize this is happening.’ That’s why I love writing Lucky – she represents how all women constantly have to be reading the room, staying one step ahead, how we can never fully relax.”
2022: Author Marissa Stapley’s Lucky break came from Reese Witherspoon
Yes, she’s writing Lucky, present tense: The sequel, No Such Thing as Lucky, will be published in October, 2027. (The TV series writers already have a copy for a potential Season 2.) “I would love for Lucky to become a Jack Reacher-esque character, I could write her for the rest of my life,” Stapley says.
She also wants to add screenwriting to her resume. Being a writer on Lucky season one wasn’t possible; her kids were too young for her to decamp to Los Angeles for six months, and it can be hard for a novelist to be present when other writers are critiquing their material.
“I could see myself having to go cry in the bathroom,” Stapley says. “But now I think I’m ready for it.” (And her kids are in university.) She’s currently shopping an original series idea around Hollywood – at least 17 buyers have been interested, thanks to the power of Witherspoon’s imprimatur – and one of her requirements is that she gets a seat in the writers’ room. “I’m just so ready to take these opportunities that are coming my way,” she says.
As we’ve been talking, Stapley has finished making breakfast sandwiches for her husband and kids; we’ve switched from video to phone because of a weak WiFi connection; her two cats and the two contractors renovating her cottage have been roaming around; she’s getting ready to fly to Los Angeles and New York to walk red carpets for Lucky’s premiere and then settle her daughter in Montreal for university.
“These are the most amazing ‘problems’ to have, so much fullness in your life,” Stapley says. “Last night I was floating in the lake, looking at my cottage. My husband and kids were on the dock, and I made myself sit in the moment and take it in: ‘You are happy! This is success. You have accomplished this.’ But I don’t want to stop being ambitious. It’s okay to still be striving. I’m a naturally anxious person, so I’m trying to remind myself that whatever happens now, it’s the icing on the cake. But I have the cake.”