Suspense author, Dan Schorr, joins us this week to discuss his latest novel
Author Name: Dan Schorr
Book Title: Open Bar
Book Genre: Political Thriller
Release Date: August 12, 2025
Publisher: SparkPress
Welcome, Dan! How would you describe Open Bar?
Based on my experience as a sex crimes prosecutor and investigator, Open Bar follows the chaotic fallout when a high-profile sexual misconduct scandal rocks a prominent university. Kirkus Reviews called Open Bar “A timely and absorbing novel that asks what it costs to tell the truth” and said “Schorr’s prose is clean, fast-moving, and often laced with dark humor.”
What sparked the idea for this book?
Four years ago I was eagerly preparing for the publication of my debut novel Final Table and trying to figure out an idea for a follow-up novel. As I biked with my family on a nice summer day, I started thinking about some of the chaotic and toxic situations I’ve seen develop as companies and universities seek to investigate complex, high-profile sexual misconduct investigations. (I know, I really need to think about more relaxing things when biking.) I began to consider how the news media often covers such cases, but they’re generally unable to tell the inside story of the real behind-the-scenes problematic battles when campus, corporate, and local political interests don’t neatly align with seeking justice for those involved. That was the beginning of my journey to writing Open Bar.
What’s your favorite part about writing/being an author? What do you find challenging?
Writing is very cathartic. There’s nothing else like it. One reason I love fiction writing is because, like everyone, I have many personal experiences that, if I wrote about them publicly in a memoir or in an essay, it would be highly inappropriate. But I’ve been able to write about them in fiction in Final Table and Open Bar and been told they’re interesting, creative, and (sometimes) funny. Then when I tell some people these scenes are based on my real experiences, they don’t really believe me.
One of the most challenging and frustrating parts of writing is coming up with lines I really like but then seeing they just don’t fit with the story. I give them to a specific character and it’s just not working. So I try them with another character and it still doesn’t work. Or they may fit the story, but they make the scene too wordy. So I have to just cut the lines, even if I love them. I have a Word document of pages and pages of lines that I hope to use one day but I just haven’t found a home for them yet.
What about the writing/editing/publishing process has been the most surprising to you so far?
The biggest shock to me has been learning that so many men just don’t read novels. When my debut novel Final Table was published, guy friends and acquaintances said over and over some version of this to me: “Congratulations! Your book sounds so interesting. I would totally read it if I read novels.” Another (better) male comment I sometimes received was, “I never read novels but I read yours!” I’m trying to understand this phenomenon and (hopefully) change it.
Are you working on a new project? Please tell us about it.
Yes, I am working on a third novel called In Happier Times, about a woman searching for the biological mother of her stalker ex-boyfriend, who was adopted at birth. As with my novels Final Table and Open Bar, this book is inspired by actual investigations that I have conducted.
Where can readers find you?
I write a weekly Substack newsletter about fiction reading and writing, and anyone can subscribe for free at substack.danschorr.com. More information about Open Bar and my first novel Final Table is also available at my author website danschorrbooks.com.
Thank you, Dan! Open Bar is out TODAY.
Open Bar
When the longtime abuse by a university’s softball coach of teenagers in its youth summer softball program—and the university’s strategic cover-up of those crimes—comes to light, a community is turned upside down in this drama-filled thriller perfect for fans of Kate Elizabeth Russell and Allison Leotta.
Campus, corporate, and local politics collide when a high-profile sexual misconduct scandal rocks a prominent university.
Serena Stanfield, Mountain Hill University’s human resources director, has just learned that the school’s softball coach has been molesting teenagers in its youth summer softball program for years, and that the university has covered it up from both her and the public. Troy Abernathy, a junior associate at an international investigations firm, is navigating a turbulent, toxic workplace as the company aims to be retained by the university to investigate these sexual assault allegations. Megan Black, a new member of the Mountain Hill City Council, is thrust into the fallout from the national scandal while she simultaneously focuses on securing a presidential commutation for her childhood friend, who is unfairly facing decades in prison after stabbing her abusive husband to death in self-defense.
As additional disturbing details of the coach’s actions are uncovered, Serena, Troy, Megan, and other prominent community figures confront competing interests and unique obstacles while they each pursue different paths toward obtaining justice for the softball program’s sexual abuse survivors—and offer conflicting understandings of what justice would even mean.
Author Bio:
Dan Schorr is a sexual misconduct investigator at his firm, Dan Schorr, LLC, and an adjunct professor at Fordham Law School. Previously, he served as a New York sex crimes prosecutor, the Inspector General for the City of Yonkers, and an adjunct law professor with Tsinghua University in Beijing, China. He has been a television legal analyst for Good Morning America, CNN, Fox News Channel, Law & Crime network, and elsewhere. Schorr lives in Rye Brook, New York with his wife and two children. His debut novel Final Table was the Indie Excellence Awards Winner in Literary Fiction. His second novel Open Bar is the American Fiction Awards winner in the Political Thriller category.