At the age of twelve, Bethany Joy Lenz grabbed a newly-arrived Macintosh—bulky by today’s standards—and began her first attempt at novel-making. She recalls the sensation as "like I’m on my AOL dial-up, and then I was on the computer writing this book," a vivid image of the slow-connect era colliding with youthful imagination. The story centered on a girl named Lucretia, whom she nicknamed Luke, and explored school bullies and a boy-best-friend dynamic, essentially mirroring the teen’s own reality.
Although that early manuscript never reached a publisher, the experience planted a seed that would germinate thirty-three years later. In the week of its release, The Betrayal of Cora Wexford—Lenz’s debut novel—arrived on shelves, inviting readers into a meticulously crafted Victorian London where art, murder, and psychological control intertwine.
From a bedroom scribble to a published debut
During the early 2000s, Lenz’s teenage years were defined by an intense urge to express herself through words, a habit she describes as essential for her “neuro-spicy brain.” She explains that putting thoughts on paper helped her organize memories and emotions, a practice that later evolved into a lifelong creative rhythm. The transition from a secretive school-yard tale to a full-blown historical thriller required a “heavy lift,” as she put it, because the novel demanded extensive research, fully realized characters, and a vivid recreation of a city long gone.
Whitechapel murders meet modern emotional abuse
The novel draws its spine from the infamous string of eleven killings that rattled London’s East End between 1888 and 1891, collectively known as the Whitechapel Murders. While some of those deaths are still attributed to the legendary Jack the Ripper, Lenz uses the chilling backdrop to explore a different kind of terror—one that thrives in silence. "It became clear to me that the best way to tell this story was to parallel the horrendous psychological and emotional violence that so many of us still experience today," she says, emphasizing that such abuse is “unspoken” and often invisible to legal systems.
The protagonist, Cora Wexford, is an American expatriate who works as a postmortem artist, painting detailed portraits of the city’s most marginalized women while a serial killer stalks the streets. On the eve of her thirty-nine-th birthday, she encounters Miles Vale, a striking yet unsettling stranger whose charm masks a manipulative agenda. Their evolving relationship becomes a study in gaslighting and power dynamics, echoing the novel’s broader commentary on how emotional manipulation can be as lethal as any blade.
Research, art, and the quiet rebellions that fuel a novel
Lenz’s investigative process blended digital digging with on-the-ground immersion. She spent hours scrolling through archives online, then booked a trip to London, wandering the alleys with noise-canceling earbuds looping three hours of Victorian street sounds she found on YouTube. “I’m familiar with the city from hanging out with friends, so I wasn’t trying to get my bearings, but I’d never gone as a tourist,” she explains, noting that the auditory backdrop helped her capture the era’s ambience.
Beyond research, Lenz tackled the visual identity of her book herself. A former high-school art enthusiast who later dabbled in abstract painting in a tiny Manhattan apartment, she was initially hesitant to paint people. Yet when her editor suggested she create the cover, she seized the chance, insisting that the piece be “just for me” rather than a marketable commodity. The resulting artwork, an abstract yet unsettling portrait, now frames the story’s edge.
One line that resonated with readers reads, “Quiet rebellions, I get away with them all the time.” Lenz interprets this as the power of holding one’s tongue in a world that demands constant validation. She likens it to choosing silence over the desperate need to be seen—a subtle defiance against internalized criticism that mirrors the novel’s theme of hidden oppression.
Having survived a decade-long ordeal in a high-control religious group that extracted more than $2 million and forced an unwanted marriage—a saga she chronicled in the 2024 memoir Dinner for Vampires—Lenz channels that personal turbulence into fiction. By weaving historical bloodshed with contemporary psychological wounds, she offers readers a dual lens through which to examine both past horrors and the still-present shadows of emotional abuse.
