What is the title of your latest release?
IF NOT YOU
What’s the “elevator pitch” for your new book?
Rival copywriters with years of contentious history get stuck together on a month-long work trip as their advertising agencies compete on a career-defining pitch for a luxury resort brand.
How did you decide where your book was going to take place?
IF NOT YOU is a travel book – to four locations, though one is a bit of a spoiler and doesn’t get featured on the book’s gorgeous three-panel cover. The three primary settings are Chicago, where Mattie and Campbell live and work, plus Aspen, Colorado and Bodega Bay, California, where they travel for a client pitch. I used to work in the advertising industry in Chicago myself, so that felt like a natural backdrop for their careers, and I loved both the juxtaposition and the cinematic nature of taking them to the mountains and the ocean.
Would you hang out with your heroine in real life?
100%! Mattie is ambitious and direct and fiercely loyal, three things I love in a woman.
What are three words that describe your hero?
Campbell is a smart-alecky secret softie.
What’s something you learned while writing this book?
That it was a lot of work to combine my two careers – novel-writing and copywriting – for a book! I spent many hours coming up with fictional ad campaigns for Mattie and Campbell.
Do you edit as you draft or wait until you are totally done?
I do line-level edits as I draft but wait until the manuscript is complete to actually revise. I keep a list of edits I know I’ll need to make as I go, so that I don’t forget to come back to them.
What’s your favorite foodie indulgence?
Like Mattie, I love a Pringle.
Describe your writing space/office!
My office is my happy place. It’s full of books (of course), art that keeps me creative, and always my two bulldogs.
Who is an author you admire?
Recently, I’ve loved new books from Samantha Markum (THE LAWS OF LOVE AND GRAVITY), Mara Williams (THE OTHER SIDE OF STARTING OVER), and Julie Olivia (LOVE FELT LIKE THIS).
Is there a book that changed your life?
I recently re-read Anne Lamott’s BIRD BY BIRD, which is full of wisdom that every writer can benefit from. It moved me as much (probably more!) now as it did when I first read it as a teenager.
Tell us about when you got “the call.” (when you found out your book was going to be published). Or, for indie authors, when you decided to self-publish.
IF NOT YOU is the second book in a two-book contract, so the process of selling in the idea to my publisher looked a bit different! When I sold my first contemporary romance, THE HEARTBREAK HOTEL, to Berkley, my editor asked about other ideas I had, and I pitched If Not You. She loved it, so I drafted a proposal after finishing edits for THE HEARTBREAK HOTEL and got formal approval to move on to the full draft.
What’s your favorite genre to read?
I love any book that gets me into my feelings – whether that’s romance, literary fiction, young adult. But almost all my favorite books have a strong romance plot, regardless of genre.
What’s your favorite movie?
The Mummy (1999)
What is your favorite season?
Autumn
How do you like to celebrate your birthday?
A good meal with people I love, followed by a long snuggle with my dogs.
What’s a recent tv show/movie/book/podcast you highly recommend?
I’ve been on deadline for a new book, which leaves very little room in my brain to digest new content! My husband and I have been deep in old seasons of the Australian version of Survivor, which I can’t recommend more highly.
What’s your favorite type of cuisine?
I love to try new foods! But I’m always in the mood for sushi.
What do you do when you have free time?
Living in Colorado means there’s never an excuse to be bored: I love to hike, ski, and paddleboard.
What can readers expect from you next?
My next book, NO WILDER THING, will publish in late 2027. It’s a dual-timeline, second-chance romance set on a long-distance hiking trail in the Colorado mountains.
IF NOT YOU by Ellen O’Clover
Five years of history. Four weeks on the road. Two rival copywriters learning love is the hardest sell of all.
Mattie French has always known how to tell a good story. It’s why she stopped at nothing to land her dream career as a copywriter at a scrappy independent advertising agency. In fact, if it weren’t for one person, Mattie would probably be the most‑talked‑about rising star in town.
Campbell Porter is a senior copywriter at Chicago’s slickest agency. Absurdly talented, incredibly aware of it, and the bane of Mattie’s existence since they were interns together, Campbell is always just…there, with his golden‑boy smirk and the familiar gaze that never fails to taunt her across a crowded room.
Mattie would love nothing more than to avoid Campbell forever. But when their agencies are pitted against each other to compete for a luxury resort account, it’s her chance to prove she can beat him—and earn the promotion she covets.
During the month of travel required for the pitch, Mattie and Campbell are thrown together as fierce competitors and, slowly, as unexpected witnesses to each other’s hidden wounds and softest parts. As their trip barrels toward its final pitch, Mattie is forced to confront the increasingly obvious truth: the story she’s crafted for her and Campbell over the years might need a new ending.
Romance Contemporary | Romance Comedy [ Berkley, On Sale: September 15, 2026, Trade Paperback / e-Book / audiobook, ISBN: 9780593952566 / eISBN: 9780593952573 ]
Buy IF NOT YOU: Amazon.com | Kindle | BN.com | Apple Books | Kobo | Google Play | Books-A-Million | Indie BookShops | Libro.fm | Audible | Walmart.com | Amazon CA | Amazon UK | Amazon DE | Amazon FR
About Ellen O’Clover
Ellen O’Clover writes stories about love, identity, and belonging for both teens and adults. She grew up in Ohio and studied creative writing at the Johns Hopkins University before moving west to Colorado, where she lives in a little green house under a giant aspen tree with her rocket scientist husband and two perfect bulldogs.
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