All in a lather: Lifelong friendships face novel challenges in Jenny Jackson’s ‘The Shampoo Effect.’

On this episode of Fully Booked, New York Times bestselling author Jenny Jackson joins us to discuss The Shampoo Effect (Pamela Dorman/Viking, June 30)—recently named Read With Jenna’s book club pick for July 2026.

“A beginning author gets in over her head, personally and professionally,” Kirkus writes in an admiring review of The Shampoo Effect, a winning novel about a group of lifelong friends in a fictional seaside town in Massachusetts who admit said author into their ranks, with life-altering results.

Jackson is the vice president and editorial director of fiction at Alfred A. Knopf. Her debut novel, Pineapple Street, was an instant New York Times bestseller. A graduate of Williams College and the Columbia Publishing Course, she was raised in Ipswich, Massachusetts, and lives in Brooklyn Heights with her family.

Here’s a bit more from our review of The Shampoo Effect: “Knopf editor Jackson’s sophomore novel—after the bestselling Pineapple Street (2023)—begins with a high-flying, multiphase meet-cute. Caroline Lash, 28, is traveling to the fictional town of Greenhead, Massachusetts, where she’s been awarded an 18-month-long writer’s residency in a beach cottage.…Soon Caroline is quite madly in love with Van Whittaker, who comes with a close-knit lifelong friend group, a set of 30-somethings with small children.…Jackson rotates the point of view around the set of friends, deftly depicting the practices and pressures of modern parents.…Updike fans will scent an update of that writer’s fraught suburban scandals even before the author’s note acknowledging the inspiration. This easy read combines a literary rom-com with an acute portrait of midlife among millennials.”

Jackson and I discuss the meaning of the phrase “the shampoo effect,” why it was the right title for her novel, and her fundamental belief that life is “difficult and messy and embarrassing but also downright funny.” We talk about the classic narrative trope a stranger comes to town, the differences between New York and Massachusetts, the particularities of Van’s friend group, and the high stakes of lifelong friendship. We dig into second novels, swans, sleeping porches, the great American novel, and much more.

At the end of our interview, Jackson recommends a debut novel she loves. Follow @kirkus_reviews on Instagram, DM us the title of that novel, along with your email and location, and you’ll be entered in a drawing to receive a $100 Visa gift card, courtesy of Kirkus. The giveaway is open to legal residents of the U.S. who have reached 18 years of age or older at the time of entry.

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Fully Booked is produced by Jessica Lockhart and Megan Labrise.