Susan Rivers began her writing career as a playwright, receiving the Julie Harris Playwriting Award and the New York Drama League Award, and working as an NEA Writer-in-Residence in San Francisco. Her focus shifted to fiction with a move to the Carolinas in 1995. Rivers' debut novel, The Second Mrs. Hockaday, was published by Algonquin Books in 2017. It was a People Magazine "Best New Books Pick" and a Woman's Day "Editor's Desk Pick" in 2017, as well as IndieNext, Library Reads and Winter OKRA Picks, and was a Women's National Book Association Great Group Reads 2018 Selection. The novel was a finalist for the Center for Fiction's First Novel Prize 2017 and the Southern Book Prize 2018. The author lives and writes in upstate South Carolina.