James: In the Wolf family, Jenny just refuses to be part of it. That's how I sort of envisioned her, Jenny, with her high school team on the field and commanding, at the end of Wildcats once she's commanded all this respect from the team, and then how she can deftly go and just sit there on the forty-yard line and call all the shots and have such great command of football. Do you remember that movie with Goldie Hawn? She's the track coach. It actually reminded me - I don't know if you remember the movie Wildcats from the 1980s.

I think the reason all the smart women like this book is because it's about a really smart woman who is really strutting her stuff. Mike: My daughter Hannah likes House of Wolves much better than she liked The Horsewoman. James: That was a book that we wrote as well, Mike and I. The Horsewoman came out of that world and came out of her life, a lot of it. You have to understand, my daughter is a rider. Zibby: Is that a good thing, or is that not a good thing? It's brought me and my mother-in-law closer together. Mike: Zibby, I've got a lot of smart women in my life, as Jim does with Sue. Then Mike, you had different folks reading it. We had the toughest focus group of all because we gave it out to my wife Sue, who thought it was the best book I've ever dealt with. They were brought up to eat one another by their father, who's this tough, unpleasant, but humorous guy. James: I do anyway, and I think Mike and I both do, I think a lot of people like these family saga things, whether it's Succession or Yellowstone or the Corleones. First of all, it's about another great woman character from the firm of Patterson and Lupica, a young woman named Jenny Wolf, who is - Jim, I don't think this spoils any to say she's not supposed to inherit the family empire in newspapers and a San Francisco football team, but she does, much to the extreme unhappiness of her three brothers who all thought they were the boy princes who were going to grow up to be king.

James Patterson: Mike, what is this one about anyway? Do you remember? Can you please tell listeners what this book is about? Welcome, Jim and Mike, to 'Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.' Thank you for coming on to discuss The House of Wolves. Listen to this episode for a good laugh–James and Mike are hilarious! Transcript: They also share the (quirky) details of their writing partnership (it involves late-night phone calls and finishing each other's sentences) and reveal the actors they hope would play their characters on the big screen.

The three discuss the book’s most memorable elements–its powerful female protagonist, intricate sibling rivalries, and sports. Zibby is joined by New York Times bestselling authors James Patterson and Mike Lupica to discuss The House of Wolves, an unforgettable thriller about Jenny Wolf, her murdered father, and the billion-dollar empire he left her with.

The House of Wolves by James Patterson