Colleen Hoover “Almost Embarrassed” to Say She Wrote ‘It Ends With Us’ After Controversy, Legal Battle

It Ends With Us author Colleen Hoover is addressing the “circus” surrounding the feature film adaptation and how it has overshadowed her feelings towards the story.

In an interview with Elle published Thursday, the author discussed the controversy surrounding the 2024 film adaptation of her novel starring Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni, who also directed.

Last December, Lively filed a complaint against Baldoni, for sexual harassment and an alleged coordinated effort to destroy her reputation, per the filing obtained by The Hollywood Reporter. Baldoni’s legal team slammed the complaint as “shameful” and the “serious and categorically false accusations against Mr. Baldoni, Wayfarer Studios and its representatives.”

The back-and-forth has resulted in an ongoing sprawling legal battle between the actress and director and Hoover admits “it feels like a circus.” Hoover spoke with the publication prior to her having to give a deposition a few weeks later.

The author went on to explain that despite the “unfortunate” and “disappointing” drama, there are “real people involved, with real feelings and emotions.”

“This actually truly has impacted some of the actors’ careers in huge ways,” she said. “And I just find it all around sad.”

The author also explained why she is hesitant to really speak out about it all: “I’m just trying to stay removed from the negativity. I have my own story I could tell … but I don’t want to bring attention to it, and I don’t want to have to put someone else down to lift myself up. So I’d rather just ignore it and let people think and say what they’re going to say.

 “I feel like it’s so big at this point that there’s nothing anyone can say to change whatever opinion people have of it, even though no one has the actual truth. Not even me.”

Given the personal connection It Ends With Us has for Hoover — the story was inspired by Hoover’s mom leaving her abusive relationship with Hoover’s biological father — the legal drama around the film has seemingly changed the author’s perspective on the story, she admitted.

“The book was inspired by her story, and now it gives us PTSD to think about it,” Hoover said of the story being inspired by her mom. “I feel awful because I almost feel like she’s gone through more with the aftermath of this film, more pain than she went through with my dad, just seeing the ugliness of it.”

Following its 2016 publication, the novel became a bestseller with Hoover and marked the first of her novels to get the film adaptation treatment. However Hoover admitted of her novel that she “can’t even recommend it anymore.”

“I feel like [the lawsuit] has overshadowed it,” she added. “I’m almost embarrassed to say I wrote it. When people ask what I do, I’m just like, ‘I’m a writer. Please don’t ask me what I wrote.’”

When the legal battle eventually concludes, Hoover said that perhaps her feelings may change about how “proud” she is about the book.

“The more time that passes, the easier everything gets for all of us,” Hoover said. “But it is sad, because I was very proud of that book. And I’m still proud of it, but less publicly so. Maybe I need therapy, I don’t know.”

Despite the drama, Hoover has moved on to different adaptations of her novels including Regretting You, which opened in theaters in October, starring Allison Williams and Dave Franco. Meanwhile, Reminders of Him, which will premiere in March from Universal, is the first film that she has co-written and co-produced. Her 2018 novel Verity was also adapted into a film — starring Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson and Josh Hartnett — that is set to be released from Amazon MGM Studios next October.