Erika Veurink's Plan to Become the Next Nancy Meyers

A New Chapter for Erika Veurink

Erika Veurink is sipping on a to-go tea, her hand stirring the ice while the other adjusts her sunglasses. It’s an August afternoon in Central Park, and the setting feels almost cinematic. The sunlight filters through the trees, creating a flattering glow, and a breeze hints at the coming autumn. Veurink, 32 weeks pregnant with her and her husband’s first child, has agreed to meet near Columbus Circle before her next commitments: a trip to Bergdorf Goodman and a session with her doula. “I hope she brings props,” she says with a grin. “I wouldn’t mind a PowerPoint deck.”

Veurink, a writer and brand consultant, has always been strategic. She carries herself with a Midwest earnestness that she can’t hide—and doesn’t want to. Her East Coast sensibility shines through, and at 6’2”, she’s even taller than she appears online. On Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, and Substack, she has built a loyal following of fashion enthusiasts and romance readers.

As of September 16, Veurink has become a romance novelist. Two years ago, she hadn’t even read a proper romance novel. Now, she has a deep respect for the genre and sees it as an essential new branch in what she calls “Erika Veurink Enterprises.” Her debut novel, Exit Lane, is a friends-to-lovers, missed-connections novella published by the startup 831 Stories. The book follows Marin and Teddy, two University of Iowa graduates who embark on a 16-hour move to New York City only to realize their attraction during the trip. Their paths cross again over the next eight years, leading them to confront a potential tragedy and the magnetic pull between them.

Exit Lane was inspired by When Harry Met Sally, but with a narrative style and semi-autobiographical details that are uniquely Veurink’s. Founded by best friends Erica Cerulo and Claire Mazur, 831 Stories positions itself as a “romantic fiction company” focused on building universes around its novels through events, products, TV and film projects, audio initiatives, and more. The idea of creating a cool-kid universe around a work of writing resonated deeply with Veurink, who has long embraced a portfolio career—a resume made up of connected “buckets” that add up to a larger vision.

“I’m a commercially minded person,” Veurink explains. “I like to say I’m in the business of Erika Veurink. Writing and fashion are my lenses. I hope to become a screenwriter. I imagine those things being true in any screenplay I would ever write.”

Veurink continues, lowering her voice conspiratorially. “It’s almost embarrassing to talk about it, but I want to be Nancy Meyers. I want to be a world-builder, the way that Nora Ephron’s stories all exist in the same ‘universe.’ That’s what I aspire to. I want to have a signature style, and then all these projects I bring to life live within that.”

Cerulo and Mazur couldn’t have predicted how perfectly this aspiration would align with their own when they first encountered Veurink’s work. In November 2023, Cerulo emailed Veurink a pitch with the subject line, “Reaching out about something…romantic!” and soon convinced her to try her hand at fiction again.

By this point, Veurink had earned an MFA in nonfiction from Bennington College after completing her undergraduate degree at FIT. But an unfortunate experience in a fiction-writing class at the 92nd Street Y had temporarily steered her away from attempting a novel. Veurink doesn’t mince words: “I got my a** handed to me. Everyone [in the class] was like, ‘You’re a horrible fiction writer.’ After that, I was like, ‘I don’t know.’”

But Cerulo and Mazur recognized a spark of talent—a talent for romance, even if Veurink didn’t see it yet—in one of Veurink’s short fiction pieces in Cutleaf. They assigned her a romance-reading syllabus, which included works by Bolu Babalola, Robinne Lee, Liz Tomforde, Emily Henry, and Tessa Bailey. Next, they worked together on potential log lines and outlines, eventually landing on a spin of When Harry Met Sally with a twist: “What if there was sex in the backseat of the car?”

Veurink found freedom in the rules and tropes of the romance genre. She felt as though she’d cracked some invisible code, finding comfort in the structure and expectations. “Within those tropes and formulas, romance readers are like, ‘Take me wherever you want,’” she says. “Give me a werewolf! Whatever!’ But there are these systems, these categories. And if you have a certain kind of brain, it feels so good to abide by the rules.”

Veurink’s approach to writing is deeply personal. As a teenager growing up in Des Moines, her father’s death shaped her desire for control. This trauma response has influenced her work, including her debut novel. She also credits her father, who worked in finance, with teaching her to talk openly about money. This mindset is reflected in her goal to become Nancy Meyers, with a business-minded blueprint in mind.

She keeps a New York Times op-ed by novelist Jessica Knoll bookmarked on her computer, titled “I Want to Be Rich and I’m Not Sorry.” The piece is “literally like a sacred text to me,” Veurink says. “Writing is the thing I can’t shake. It’s like my daily meditation. It’s a constant truth in my life, and the fact that I can get paid to do it is still so special to me that I feel as though I deserve to take that seriously.”

While she doesn’t expect to get rich off Exit Lane, nor necessarily off of romance writing in general, she sees her work as part of a larger storytelling machine. “I’m not the kind of person who could work on a novel for nine years and hope that it found an audience,” she says. “I think there are other writers who need that lack of commercial pressure in order to feel creative. I like knowing where something belongs, but that’s just how I operate.”

For now, Veurink is celebrating the most recent expansion of her brand. She’s curated a specific wardrobe for her book-promotion events, including Marin-inspired Prada loafers and a Teddy-inspired rugby shirt. Tonight, at the New York launch party, she’ll discuss the book with writer Joanna Goddard and honor the central lovebirds with an after-party at Baby Grand Flatiron.

“This is my first novel,” Veurink says. “This is my last one without kids. The way that people are going to respond to it is so out of my control.” So, she says, her path forward is clear. She only has one question to answer for tonight: “What am I going to sing at the karaoke after-party?”