A young Texas writer becomes a ghostwriter for a Manhattan influencer, but when her authentic voice threatens to overshadow her boss, she must fight to reclaim her identity.

SYNOPSIS:

Riley Vega arrives in New York City from Texas with a suitcase, $400, and dreams of becoming a writer. She moves into a SoHo apartment where her "room" is a curtained-off couch, and within days lands a ghostwriting job for Tara Rosewood, a glamorous lifestyle influencer whose brand is built on seeming "authentic."

Riley's writing transforms Tara's platform. Traffic surges. But Tara's assistant Mina Mills (territorial and threatened) begins sabotaging Riley at every turn: leaving her off guest lists, undermining her credibility, and quietly positioning herself as indispensable while making Riley seem expendable.

When Riley submits a personal short story to The New Yorker and it mysteriously appears on Tara's website under Riley's name, the exposure backfires. A gossip columnist connects the dots, revealing that Tara's celebrated "voice" belongs to someone else entirely. Sponsors flee. Tara, needing a scapegoat, fires Riley for plagiarism; a charge Mina fabricated using a fake blog.

Broke, humiliated, and facing eviction, Riley discovers that her roommate and hook-up, Syd has rekindled a relationship with Mina. The betrayal forces her to confront an uncomfortable truth: she's been so focused on her own ambitions that she's failed to see the people around her clearly, including Noah, a lonely ten-year-old neighbor who's been sketching her on the fire escape throughout her New York journey.

Noah's family moves away, but he leaves Riley his sketchbook. Inspired by his drawings, she chooses to write for herself, this time a children's story, The Boy on the Fire Escape instead of going back to work for Tara.

NO BYLINE