Authors Interviewing Characters: Kristine Delano

THE LIES WE TRADE

In The Lies We Trade (January 20, 2026, Tyndale), former Wall Street executive turned novelist Kristine Delano delivers a taut, emotionally charged thriller about a top portfolio manager whose life starts unraveling just as she hits the peak of her career. Her marriage is strained, her daughter is acting out, and her trusted colleague Betsey has gone rogue—leaving behind a cryptic message and a thumb drive that threatens to blow everything apart.

What begins as a personal crisis quickly escalates into something far more sinister. As Meredith races to uncover what Betsey really wants, she starts to wonder: is she being blackmailed—or warned?

An Interview with Meredith & Dave of Garman Straub

By Kristine Delano (KD), author of The Lies We Trade

KD: Today I’m joined by two of Garman Straub’s most compelling personalities Please welcome Meredith Hansel, Portfolio Manager for—

Dave: Meredith needs no introduction. She recently rang the closing bell at Thew New York Stock Exchange. Everyone tuned in, right?

KD: …and Dave Lennox, Chief Sales Officer.

Meredith: And self-appointed firm celebrity.

Dave: [lifts an eyebrow] “Self-appointed” feels disrespectful to my fan base.

Meredith: Please don’t define your coworkers as your fan base.

KD: Excellent. Let’s begin. Meredith, tell us what a Portfolio Manager at Garman Straub handles on a daily basis.

Meredith: I oversee strategy and performance for our new funds. Everything from the 6 a.m. Bloomberg alerts to late-night calls with the quant team. The fun part is the puzzle-solving. The hard part is… well, everything else.

KD: Everything else?

Meredith: [quietly] Timing. Information flows. Institutional expectations. Internal… factors.

Dave: She’s underselling the drama. If you’ve never seen Meredith stare down a volatile market, imagine someone trying to prevent a forest fire with a spray bottle.

Meredith: Thank you, Dave, for your supportive… metaphor.

KD: Dave, your turn.

Dave: As Head of Sales, I lead the teams who take the firm’s products into the world. We’re the ones clients trust or blame, depending on the quarter. Sales is part diplomacy, part performance, and part making sure portfolio managers like Meredith give us something we can sell.

Meredith: Translation: he wants perfect, predictable performance.

Dave: I want reliable. The markets can be unpredictable. You can’t be.

Meredith: [a flicker of something crosses her expression] I do my best.

KD: Meredith, you have a family outside of the city. How do you balance the demands of your job with marriage and motherhood?

Meredith: I… try. I’m ambitious and I care deeply about my work. But my family is everything. It’s just, when markets move, you have to move. You can’t say, “Sorry, let me finish dinner first.” It’s hard. My teenage daughter thinks I’m the one addicted to my phone. My husband thinks I need a clone. Some days I agree.

Dave: [shrugs] You show up. Even when you look like you haven’t slept.

Meredith: Is that a compliment?

Dave: There’s a lot to manage, including whatever else is going on in that mysterious brain of yours.

Meredith: Nothing mysterious.

Dave: Uh-huh.

KD: Let’s address the elephant in the conference room. Dave, you were hesitant to mobilize the sales force for Meredith’s funds at first. Why?

Dave: Because early numbers can lie. I’ve seen “promising” funds implode after one bad quarter. My troops are elite; I don’t send them out with untested products. So, I waited. Then the performance stabilized and—

Meredith: You changed your tune.

Dave: I updated my tune based on new information. Performance doesn’t lie.

Meredith: [under her breath] Sometimes it can.

KD: What was that?

Meredith: Nothing. Just saying, numbers need context.

Dave: The context being that you’re finally hitting your stride.

KD: Meredith, do you feel supported now?

Meredith: Supported? Yes. Trusted? Mostly.

KD: Mostly?

Meredith: [fiddles with left gold stud earring] I’m still proving myself. That’s all.

KD: Meredith, you’ve shared that impostor syndrome has played a role in your career. Is that still the case?

Meredith: I overthink. Every time I walk into a room with people who have ten more years and forty more credentials… I question and I rehearse sentences before—

Dave: You rehearse! That explains the muttering.

Meredith: I don’t mutter.

Dave: You do.

KD: And yet, Meredith, you’ve shown remarkable courage in tough moments.

Meredith: Courage is what you draw on when there’s no other choice.

KD: Anything specific on your mind?

Meredith: [too quickly] No.

Dave: She’s been more jumpy than usual, for the record.

Meredith: I’m fine.

Dave: I mean that lovingly.

Meredith: Stop talking.

KD: Without giving away any major twists, Meredith—The Lies We Trade drops you into a situation that threatens both your family and your career. How did that shift the dynamic at Garman Straub?

Meredith: It clarified things. When you’re staring down something that could blow up everything you’ve built, the office politics feel… trivial. I needed truth and I needed it quickly.  I had to figure out who I could trust.

KD: And did you figure it out?

Meredith: Eventually. It forced me to strip everything down to essentials. I suddenly needed answers. Real ones. Not the polished versions we give in meetings. And when the ground started shaking, I noticed exactly who stood close… and who stepped back.

KD: And did people step back?

Meredith: Some. Others stepped in. Or seemed to.

Dave: [light laugh, but tight] Are you implying something?

Meredith: I’m saying people respond differently under pressure.

Dave: Or when they’re hiding something. 

KD: Hiding?

Meredith: I wasn’t hiding anything. I was… managing.

Dave: Managing. Sure. [smiles, but with an edge] Look, once I understood the stakes, I got involved. I protected what I could.

KD: Protected who?

Dave: The team. The firm. [he glances toward the door] I like to understand a situation before stepping in. Rushing in blind is… risky.

KD: Risky for whom?

Dave: [measured] For everyone. Some information, especially the kind that is delivered on mysterious thumb drives, can be… mishandled.

Meredith: That’s one word for it. When you’re standing on a fault line, you start listening differently. The conversations you used to brush off suddenly feel loaded. Every spreadsheet becomes a warning. Every silence means something.

Dave: Look, Meredith didn’t share what she’d gotten herself tangled in. Not right away.

Not with me.

Meredith: I couldn’t. You know that.

Dave: Or wouldn’t. Hard to tell the difference from the outside.

KD: So, you eventually helped Meredith?

Dave: Helped? That’s a generous interpretation. Let’s just say I… positioned myself, in case things broke one way or another.

Meredith: That’s an ominous way of saying you were covering yourself.

Dave: Someone had to.

KD: Meredith, last question. What did this whole experience teach you?

Meredith: [leaning forward, eyes steady] It taught me that when your family is on the line, you stop caring who you offend or what rules you break. Because the truth is, people justify all kinds of things in the name of ambition or protection—especially the lies. They trade them like they are harmless. Necessary. Even noble.

But here’s what I learned the hard way: If you don’t stop that rationalization early, it grows teeth.

And once it starts biting, it ruins lives before you even realize you’ve been bleeding.

[The recording light blinks off. Chairs scrape. Everyone stands.]

KD: [closes her copy of The Lies We Trade] That was… intense.

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About the author: 

Kristine Delano is a former Wall Street executive turned award-winning author of domestic thrillers set in the high-stakes finance world. She hosts the We Talk Careers podcast and mentors women on work-life balance. When she’s not writing or reading, she enjoys scuba diving, playing games with friends, and chasing her family down the ski slopes of western Maine. Please connect with her on Instagram.

 

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Tags: featured, women writers

Category: Interviews, On Writing