Kathleen Barber Books in Order

Kathleen Barber is an American novelist and former attorney whose books put everyday lives under intense pressure. She was raised in Galesburg, Illinois, and attended the University of Illinois before earning her law degree from Northwestern University School of Law.

Before publishing fiction, Barber practiced bankruptcy law at firms in Chicago and New York. It was demanding work, but writing had long been part of her life in the background. She wrote for years before she gave herself the time and focus to finish a novel.

That shift came during a period of travel with her husband, after they left their jobs to see more of the world. The manuscript she completed during that time became her debut, Are You Sleeping. It first appeared in 2017 and was later republished as Truth Be Told.

The novel follows Josie Buhrman, who has spent years hiding from the fallout of her father’s murder and the collapse of her family. When a popular podcast reopens the case and raises doubts about the conviction, Josie has to return home and face the past she has carefully rebuilt her life around. The setup lets Barber dig into sisterhood, grief, old loyalties, and the uneasy way a media story can become someone else’s private nightmare.

A closed case is never quite as closed as it looks.

Truth Be Told was adapted into a television series, which brought Barber’s first novel to a much wider audience. Readers who enjoy the book often come for the murder mystery and podcast angle, then stay with Josie and her estranged twin sister, Lanie. The story is less interested in tidy answers than in what happens to a family when the public wants to relive its worst day.

Her second novel, Follow Me, moved the tension into the world of influencers, online identity, and digital surveillance. Audrey Miller arrives in Washington, D.C., for a promising new job and shares much of her polished life with a large social media following. But someone who has watched her online for years is now close enough to turn her private life into a real danger.

Barber’s early thrillers ask who gets to control the story.

With Both Things Are True, she took a turn toward contemporary romance without losing her interest in reputation, secrets, and the messiness of starting over. Vanessa, a yoga influencer whose life falls apart after her fiancé flees amid fraud allegations, heads back to Chicago and encounters Sam, the first love she never fully left behind. It is a warmer, funnier book, built around family, embarrassment, and the hard work of becoming honest with yourself.

Barber also co-wrote Sisterhood Above All with Amayah Shaienne, a thriller set during sorority recruitment at Southern State University. The story follows young women competing for status, belonging, and control inside a tense Greek-life world. Barber lives in Washington, D.C., with her family, and she is also a certified book coach who works with writers finding their way through a first draft.