COLUMBUS, GA, October 22, 2026 /24-7PressRelease/ — Author Pam Avery takes readers back to the fictional North Georgia community of Kings County—and far beyond it—in The Other Side of Tanner, her new novel being released worldwide October 1.
A sequel to Avery’s critically acclaimed and popular, The Tanner Side of Town, the new novel shifts the spotlight to Tanner Fox, the daughter of Lucy Tanner and Hunter Fox. Now in her early 50s, Tanner is a successful, high-profile attorney and fixer accustomed to helping politicians and celebrities navigate crises. But when her complicated personal life collides with a dangerous investigation, Tanner discovers that solving other people’s problems is considerably easier than confronting her own.
“After The Tanner Side of Town, I knew there were still stories to tell about this family, but I wanted to explore them through a different generation and a very different woman,” said Avery. “Tanner Fox is smart, accomplished, tough and very good at managing other people’s crises. Yet beneath all that confidence is someone struggling to manage her own life. That contradiction made her a fascinating character for me to explore.”
At the center of Tanner’s personal turmoil is her five-year affair with married U.S. Senator Cary Lancaster. She understands better than almost anyone the potentially devastating political consequences of their relationship, yet her professional instincts clash with her emotional attachment to a man whose promises have kept her waiting for years.
But The Other Side of Tanner reaches well beyond Washington politics and forbidden romance.
Back home in Kings County, the past refuses to remain buried. Tanner becomes drawn into an investigation that eventually reaches from Georgia to Chicago and Florida and involves Bill Braxton, a small-time criminal with an outsized mobster ego. As Tanner digs into Braxton’s past, she uncovers connections involving the Andrews family that turn the investigation into something deeply personal for the people closest to her.
“I wanted the book to have suspense and twists that keep readers turning the pages, but I also wanted it to be about more than solving a mystery,” Avery said. “It’s about the choices people make, the secrets they keep, the consequences that follow and the people who stand beside them when life becomes complicated. At its heart, this is still a story about family.”
The result is a novel that blends mystery and suspense with the multigenerational family relationships at the heart of Avery’s Tanner novels.
Readers of The Tanner Side of Town will encounter familiar characters decades later, including Lucy Tanner, the fiercely independent heroine of the first novel; Hunter Fox, the newspaperman who captured her heart; and Hank Tanner, now a Georgia district attorney. They are joined by a cast that includes recovering surgeon David Harrington, who operates a farm helping men rebuild their lives after addiction; Joseph Andrews; retired Chicago police officer Leo Flynn; and others whose histories become intertwined with Tanner’s search for answers.
Underlying the suspense is a larger story about family and the ties that endure across generations.
The Tanner family’s roots stretch back to the 1800s in the mountains of Georgia. The original novel centered on Lucy Tanner and the battle to protect “The Ridge,” an untouched mountain range of historical significance running through Kings County. The Other Side of Tanner picks up the family story decades later, examining what happens when a new generation inherits not only the strength of those who came before them, but also unfinished business from the past.
“The North Georgia setting is almost another character in these books,” Avery said. “The land, the family history and the sense of belonging to a place help shape who the Tanners are. You can leave home, build a career and create an entirely different life for yourself, but sometimes you must come back to where you started to understand where you’re going.”
Through Tanner, Avery also explores a distinctly contemporary contradiction: a woman professionally trained to manage chaos who cannot always control the chaos within herself. Her journey forces her to confront difficult truths about love, dependency, family, identity and what she really wants from the second half of her life.
Ultimately, The Other Side of Tanner is as much about finding peace as it is about solving a mystery.
“I hope readers are entertained by the mystery and intrigue, but I also hope they see something of themselves in these characters,” Avery said. “Life rarely gives us perfect people making perfect decisions. We make mistakes, we carry things from our past, we love people we probably shouldn’t, and sometimes we get another chance to decide who we want to be. That’s what Tanner’s journey is about.”
ABOUT PAM AVERY
Pam Avery is an author, journalist and educator whose career has crossed numerous forms of storytelling. After graduating from the University of Georgia in 1972, she worked in banking and advertising and owned a restaurant before spending 20 years teaching private dance and drama lessons. She later worked as a freelance writer, reporter, photographer and columnist for five weekly community newspapers.
After earning her master’s degree in journalism in 2012, Avery taught media writing at Columbus State University. She published her first novel, The Tanner Side of Town, in 2022. In 2024, she published What Tink Told Us, a children’s/art collectors’ book created in collaboration with nationally and internationally acclaimed artist Tom Barnes, and Dirt Road Dreams…Poems, Prose, and Photography. The Other Side of Tanner is the sequel to her debut novel.
The Other Side of Tanner is published by Shades Creek Press, LLC. ISBN: 979-8-2561-0471-9.
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