A Literary Mystery: Who Wrote The Erotic Novel That Grapples With Fundamentalist Beliefs?

The popular new novel “Corinne” is an erotic romance that deals with faith, family and separation from the church — and everyone’s wondering who wrote it. 

Corinne, the book’s heroine, is excommunicated by her fundamentalist church community as a teenager for having sex, severing ties with her family and everyone she knows. She builds a new life for herself but returns home after her mother has a heart attack. This opens old wounds and reignites old flames with her teenage sweetheart, Enoch. 

The assumption is that the author is an active member of a faith community that would punish, ostracize or look down on them if they knew the book had been published. The other assumption is that the author is well-known enough to be recognized easily. 

It’s published under the name Rebecca Morrow, which “is a pseudonym for a New York Times bestselling author” according to the book’s cover sleeve. There’s no identifying information beyond that. And as far as identifiers go, this one is particularly broad. Making it onto the New York Times Bestseller List is certainly a mark of prestige that boosts sales, but the list updates weekly, spans a large list of genres and relies only on sales per week. To be considered a New York Times bestselling author, only one of that author’s books would have to make it onto one of the bestseller lists. They can then claim that title for the rest of their life. 

As if that wasn’t broad enough, no one is even sure what religious belief the author participates in because it’s not specified in the novel. Current or former members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who read novel said it sounded like their church, down to specific dialogue and practices they were sure only church members, commonly known as Mormons, would know about — save for a few additional lines of dialogue and practices, which current or former Jehovah’s Witness readers said lined up perfectly with things they’d experienced. And so on. (The Redditor who first floated theories about the book online does note that Corinne is the name of a specifically non-Mormon town in Utah, which seems to connect it somewhat strongly to the Latter-day Saints.)

Internet sleuths have narrowed down the possibilities to Seventh Day Adventists, Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. But the apparent mash-up of religions raises more questions about just how specific the author wants to be with this fictional church and how closely they’re tied to it. It could theoretically be evangelical Christianity as a whole, or it could be Southern Baptists, Anglicans, Catholics, Pentecostals — the list goes on. It could be something completely separate from the church that’s depicted in the novel, depending on how determined the author is to preserve their identity. It at least feels safe to say that the religion in question is one that’s more common in the West, America in particular. 

Here are at least a couple of clues that narrow the possibilities somewhat. “Corinne” was published by St. Martin’s Press, an offshoot of Macmillan, so presumably the author would have a connection to this publisher.

The book also touts blurbs of endorsement from Jodi Picoult and Samantha Irby, two well-known authors — Picoult for dramatic fiction and Irby for humor essays. That suggests two possible connections the author may have or at least how well-known they are. 

Stephanie Meyer

The first assumption from many is that Stephanie Meyer, author of the “Twilight” series, is Morrow. Meyer was raised as a Latter-day Saint, where she met her husband and attended BYU. She remains an active member of the church.

Meyer has said, “​Being Mormon is a big part of who I am,” but for the most part, religion appears “unconsciously” in her books.

“Twilight” is full of the church’s rules and beliefs, even though it’s nowhere near explicitly religious. The characters don’t have premarital sex, drink alcohol, smoke tobacco or even drink coffee and tea, in accordance with the church’s health code. Additionally, characters frequently battle temptation — whether that’s with sex, strong emotion or bloodlust. Edward and his vampire family are “vegetarians” because they only consume animal blood, giving them a moral superiority to other vampires. 

Meyer’s the most well-known of the suspected authors. She’s undoubtedly got plenty of connections in the literary world and would be recognized by her church. There’s not yet a consensus about whether the prose of “Corinne” is an exact match to Meyer’s works; some have also argued that Meyer wouldn’t have written a book with so much sexual content given her past aversion to it. But that could be as good a reason as any to use a pseudonym. 

There’s one more mark against Meyer: Her books in the past have been published by Little, Brown and Company, an imprint of Hachette. So despite the strong connections, it’s unlikely Meyer is the author. Unless this conspiracy runs really, really deep. 

Amber Scorah

Former Jehovah’s Witness writer Amber Scorah has a story eerily similar to Corinne’s. She was disfellowshipped in her teenage years for being sexually active but was brought back in later in life and became a missionary for some time.

Scorah wrote about her emotional and spiritual journey of leaving the church in the memoir “Leaving the Witness.” She certainly understands the complexity of feeling trapped by a religion, being pushed out of it and having a difficult and complex relationship with it. 

However, the book was published by Viking, an imprint of Penguin Random House. Besides, Scorah’s openness about leaving the religion makes it unlikely she’d be concerned about being found out. An author who’s written a personal memoir about leaving her religion probably isn’t going to use a pseudonym to publish something similar in fiction. 

Shannon Hale 

There’s a sizable group of young adult authors who are Latter-day Saints who are less popular than Meyer but still NYT bestsellers: Ally Condie (published by Penguin Random House), Aprilynne Pike (published by HarperCollins) and Kiersten White (published by HarperCollins and Penguin Random House) to name a few. Several of these authors have collaborated with Meyer at times and write in a similar style. 

The most likely authors of this group to be linked to “Corinne” are Jessica Day George and Shannon Hale, both of whom have been published by Macmillan. 

Hale in particular has spoken about approaching religion with an open-mindedness that may not otherwise be accepted. 

“I would defend an atheist’s right to write a book about a child who’s an atheist, and I would defend a Muslim’s right to write about a child who’s Muslim,” she told Deseret News. “I think representation of any kind is important.”

Maybe — just maybe — that representation includes Latter-day Saints who have been cast out and who are struggling with their identity going forward. In this case, it’s difficult to tell; the mystery of “Corinne” is one that’s likely to remain unsolved.

Jillian Cheney is a contributing culture writer for Religion Unplugged. She also writes on American Protestantism and evangelical Christianity and was Religion Unplugged’s 2020-21 Poynter-Koch fellow. You can find her on Twitter @_jilliancheney.