Debut Novel — Coming Soon

Before She Knew

by B.G. Topping

Her mother had carried it to her grave —
a secret that changed not just who Bria was,
but who she had always been.

Women's Fiction

Before She Knew

Bria Dean has spent her entire life believing her father was dead. She grieved him without ever knowing his face.

When her mother dies suddenly — no warning, no goodbye, no last conversation — Bria is left to sort through the wreckage of a life she thought she understood. What she finds instead is a DNA test, a half-brother she never knew existed, and the truth her mother carried to her grave.

Her father wasn't dead.
He just didn't know she existed.

Set in the heat and heartbreak of New Orleans' French Quarter, Before She Knew is a novel about the lies we inherit, the people who anchor us anyway, and what it means to finally know where you come from.

Coming Soon

About the Author

B.G. Topping

B.G. Topping is a graphic designer and brand strategist based in Columbus, Georgia. She writes the kind of stories that live at the intersection of grief, identity, and the quiet courage it takes to keep going.

Before She Knew is her debut novel — drawn from the landscape of real loss, real discovery, and a lifetime of learning what it means to finally know where you come from.

From the Novel

She was twenty-seven years old and she looked exactly like herself, which had taken longer to achieve than it should have.

The light arrived sideways, warm and unhurried, and it made the whole apartment feel like a painting. She opened all four windows first thing. Before coffee. Before anything.

She was happy. She didn't examine it. That was the thing about happiness when it was real and quiet and ordinary — you didn't poke at it. You just stood at a window and listened to the city wake up and let it be enough.

— Before She Knew, Chapter One

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