Carley Fortune’s debut romance “Every Summer After” has sold over a million copies since 2022, and its Prime Video adaptation “Every Year After” premiered two weeks ago. Fortune, who previously served as an executive editor at Refinery29 Canada, credits both h
Two weeks is all it took for “Every Year After” to enter the public conversation—and for Carley Fortune’s lake-town romance to feel suddenly bigger than the book that started it.
Her debut novel. “Every Summer After. ” first published in 2022. was set in Barry’s Bay. Ontario. where Fortune grew up on a lake. It has since sold over a million copies. Now the television adaptation. “Every Year After. ” premiered on Prime Video two weeks ago. charting in the top ten on Amazon Prime Video. For Fortune, the shift isn’t just creative. It’s also the clearest sign yet that romance—especially stories built around place. emotion. and audience pull—has entered a new investment phase.
Fortune’s path to this moment wasn’t straightforward. She began writing “Every Summer After” after stepping away from corporate pressure: she had been the then-executive editor of Refinery29 Canada. and. frustrated by the business side of the job. returned to the lake where she grew up. What followed moved fast—five best-selling books published in five years, plus two projects in development at Netflix.
In the Prime Video adaptation. Fortune is not only the author whose book is being brought to screen; she serves as an executive producer and described her focus as protecting the “spirit and tone” of the novel while also growing it—because the series is one they’re “really hoping” will last multiple seasons. She says she wanted Percy and Sam’s story at the heart of the show while expanding the world around them.
The adaptation leans into that balance through both casting choices and story structure. Fortune says the cast happened to match what readers were picturing, but that it wasn’t the priority. Instead. the team looked for whether the actors embodied the characters—whether Percy felt like Percy. Sam felt like Sam. and whether the chemistry worked.
There’s also a deliberate shift in who gets screen time. In the books, Jordie is “just mentioned” and doesn’t take up much time. In the series. Fortune points to a larger role for Jordie through Sam’s sounding board. and she emphasizes the importance of expanding Percy’s circle too. Delilah and Chantal. Percy’s friends. take on new roles that give the show a wider emotional lens—especially important because “so much of it” is interior in the novel. told from Percy’s point of view.
She also singled out a key scene fans already know from the book: the “you came home” moment. when Percy and Sam see each other for the first time as adults. Fortune said showrunner Amy Harris understood what readers would want to see. and the scene has landed “so well.” She added that someone online took the scene from the book and matched it to how it plays out in the show. noting it was “beat for beat.”.
The expansion has consequences beyond one story beat. Fortune says she and Harris share a storytelling approach—an emphasis on empathy. characters “with a lot of heart but are flawed and are on a journey. ” and coming-of-age arcs where the growth never really ends. When she watches additions not in the books. she says she looks for whether they feel true to the spirit of what she writes.
The series finale, Fortune says, is built to keep that story machine running. She described how the finale sets up “One Golden Summer” and Alice—Charlie’s love interest—from that book. She’s hopeful for a second season so the “One Golden Summer” storyline can be woven into everything else unfolding in Barry’s Bay. Her wish list doesn’t stop there. She also wants to see what happens with Chantal. Delilah. and Jordie. and she frames the storytelling shift this way: with Percy and Sam in season one as a “will they. won’t they?” setup. and season two as a “how will they?” phase.
Outside the screen, the business stakes are becoming harder to miss. Fortune describes herself as arriving in publishing at a time when Hollywood “wasn’t very interested in romantic stories. ” and says it has shifted quickly since then. She published “Every Summer After” in 2022—at a moment when she felt romantic work wasn’t a priority for studios. Now she says she’s fortunate to have projects that have been greenlit.
She connects the momentum to audience power. arguing that publishing has long known the strength of these readers—especially young women and women primarily—but that mainstream recognition lagged. She frames it as a turning point in how streamers view fandom: readers show up. and women and girls are fans. That audience. she says. has moved from being overlooked to becoming a kind of proof point—what Prime Video has “so smartly identified” as an engine for commitment.
That audience awareness also draws a line back to her journalism career. Fortune says she used to be a journalist for 15 years, and worked in women’s media for the last seven. At Refinery29 Canada, she launched the Canadian edition, served as executive editor, hired the editorial team, and oversaw audience strategy. She called it her last job in journalism, describing it as both her best work and a deeply unhappy experience.
The business pressures were intense. Refinery29 was American-based. and Fortune says they were “constantly” mixed about whether to keep the Canadian edition going—leading her to fight for it and ultimately push her toward a creative pivot. She said that frustration—especially the corporate strain—was a major reason she decided to write her first novel.
From that experience. she says she learned to push harder across cultural differences. noting how working as a Canadian with Americans taught her what she needed to do differently. She also recalled her boss. Christine Barberich. as the first person who told her she should be writing. praising the ambition that push inspired.
Even her writing process. she says. is shaped by editing instincts: once she sat down to write. the challenge was getting a draft done. She described setting a daily word count goal. hitting it. and not allowing perfectionism to drag her back into polishing—just to reach the end. She said she wouldn’t continue writing if she weren’t writing for an audience. and that audience-building thinking—what conversations happen. when they happen. and how people connect—came straight from journalism.
Fortune’s broader expansion suggests the same pattern. She has other adaptations in development. Her third novel. “This Summer Will Be Different. ” set in Toronto and Prince Edward Island. is shooting as a ten-episode series for Netflix this summer. with casting underway. She also has “Meet Me at the Lake” in development with Netflix as a film. “One Golden Summer” has Amazon rights. and Fortune hopes it can be woven into “Every Year After” if there is a second season. She also said “Our Perfect Storm” is in development. and she feels strongly it should be a film rather than a series.
For now. Fortune is in the middle of the transition from author to something broader—an imprint with its own production momentum. She described a “very wild few months. ” with book tour and promotion of the show. and said she needs “to take some time this summer to think about where I’ve come.” She also mentioned a merchandising line of business. adding that she thinks there’s “more” she’d like to do.
And if readers want to find the feeling behind the fiction. she points them to the real place that shaped her most. Fortune says you can come to the real Barry’s Bay in Ontario. though she notes it’s a drive from any airport—two hours from Ottawa and four hours from Toronto. She says you can visit the tavern the book is based on and do “all the fun Barry’s Bay things.” She also suggests Muskoka. north of Toronto. as another option with many lakes—one she describes as “much fancier. ” where cottages are associated with Cindy Crawford. Goldie Hawn. and Steven Spielberg.
For Fortune, the renaissance of romance isn’t just a trend. It’s a return—back to summers that feel short enough to hurt, and back to an audience that, once it arrives, refuses to leave.
Carley Fortune Every Summer After Every Year After Prime Video romance adaptations Netflix series Amazon rights Barry’s Bay Refinery29 Canada book-to-screen