NEW YORK – Reese Witherspoon's first novel for adults began with the kind of inspiration veteran fiction writers know well — a character who wouldn't leave her alone.

A military doctor who ends up performing plastic surgery for mysterious clients.

“I had never had an idea for a character in my whole life. She was sort of living in my head, and once that happens I knew I was going to have to do something about it,” Witherspoon said this week as she and co-author Harlan Coben spoke in a conference room at the Apple SoHo store in downtown Manhattan, shortly before they were interviewed for an upcoming podcast, Bookmark.

“And so I called Harlan.”

The novel, which has just been published, is called “Gone Before Goodbye.” The woman in Witherspoon's mind became Maggie McCabe, an Army co

See Full Page