Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Alumni
  • Login
  • Volunteer
  • Clubs
  • Reunions
  • Magazine
  • Class Notes
  • Help
  • Give Now
  • Stories
  • Alumni Directory
  • Lifelong Learning
  • Careers
  • Programs & Events
  • Giving
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Alumni→
  • Stories→

Stories

Stories

01 Dec 2016

Inside the Bestseller List with Gayle Tzemach Lemmon

Re: Gayle Lemmon (MBA 2006); By: April White
Topics: Information-BooksPsychology-CreativitySociety-CulturePsychology-Conflict and ResolutionPersonal Development-General
ShareBar

Gayle Tzemach Lemmon
(photo by Robb Dickehut)

Gayle Tzemach Lemmon
(photo by Robb Dickehut)

“I had no idea how to write a book. Who does?” says author Gayle Tzemach Lemmon (MBA 2006). “But the only way to do it is to do it.” Lemmon, a former political reporter, started reporting her first book while at HBS, sparked by a case she coauthored with Professor Geoffrey Jones on female entrepreneurship in Afghanistan. The Dressmaker of Khair Khana tells the true story of an entrepreneurial young woman succeeding in Taliban-ruled Kabul. It became a bestseller.

“Business is the force that is changing the world, both for the better and for the more challenging,” says Lemmon, who wrote The Dressmaker while working at global investment management firm PIMCO. “I want to tell stories that have implications for the broader community, and take people into worlds they think they know but don’t. I want to make these issues, these conflicts, these development discussions deeply personal.”

Lemmon’s latest book, Ashley’s War, is a very different tale, but it addresses some of the same issues of resilience, courage, and leadership she explored in The Dressmaker. The true story of the female soldiers who served alongside male-only US Special Operations teams in Afghanistan became a bestseller and is being turned into a movie by Reese Witherspoon. But Lemmon, now a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, is proudest of the book’s place on another list: Ashley’s War has been added to the US Special Operations Command commander’s reading list.

+ ONLINE
web-only content

Gayle Tzemach Lemmon takes you behind the scenes of her books on the Skydeck podcast

Return to The Year in Books 2016
ShareBar

Featured Alumni

Gayle Lemmon
MBA 2006
Login to send a message

Post a Comment

Featured Alumni

Gayle Lemmon
MBA 2006
Login to send a message

Related Stories

    • 01 Jun 2025
    • HBS Magazine

    Alumni and Faculty Books

    Re: Charley Ellis (MBA 1963); Maria Ellis (OPM 32); Anson Frericks (MBA 2011); Don Gillis (PMD 66); P.J. Kirby (MBA 1978); Larry Lepard (MBA 1983); Mike Mears (MBA 1975); John Travers (MBA 2002); Lee Wilson (MBA 1978); Matthew C. Weinzierl (Joseph and Jacqueline Elbling Professor of Business Administration Senior Associate Dean for Faculty Development and Research); Arthur C. Brooks (Professor of Management Practice); Ranjay Gulati (Paul R. Lawrence MBA Class of 1942 Professor of Business Administration); Gunnar Trumbull (Philip Caldwell Professor of Business Administration)
    • 01 Mar 2025
    • HBS Magazine

    Alumni and Faculty Books

    Re: Chinwe Ajene (MBA 2003); Andrew Brodsky (PHDOB 2017); Brian Buxton (MBA 1977); Kweilin Ellingrud (MBA 2005); Anne Fonte (MBA 1992); Steve Ossad (MBA 1976); Aaron Poynton (AMP 195); Gregory Slayton (MBA 1990); Karen Swanson (MBA 1990); Teresa M. Amabile (Edsel Bryant Ford Professor of Business Administration, Emerita); Alison Wood Brooks (O'Brien Associate Professor of Business Administration); Jeffrey J. Bussgang (Senior Lecturer of Business Administration)
    • 15 Dec 2024
    • HBS Magazine

    Alumni and Faculty Books

    Re: Kavita Bhatnagar (SELP 11); Amar Bhide (MBA 1979); Siri Chilazi (MBA 2016); Christopher Cox (MBA 1997); Gurcharan Das (AMP 91); Maria Ellis (OPM 32); Brooks Fenno (MBA 1962); Sue Hemphill (PMD 47); Frank Lorenzo (MBA 1963); John Lotz (MBA 1971); Ron May (AMP 165); Rusty McClure (MBA 1975); Allie Nava (MBA 2002); Wilbur Ross (MBA 1961); Garry Sanderson (AMP 175); Ken Wilcox (MBA 1983); Rick Williams (PMD 33); Michael Horn (MBA 2006); Max H. Bazerman (Jesse Isidor Straus Professor of Business Administration); Ethan S. Bernstein (Edward W. Conard Associate Professor of Business Administration); Malcolm S. Salter (James J. Hill Professor of Business Administration, Emeritus); Feng Zhu (MBA Class of 1958 Professor of Business Administration)
    • 01 Sep 2024
    • HBS Alumni Bulletin

    Ink: Framing the Full Picture

    Re: Amy Chu (MBA 1999); By: Jen McFarland Flint

More Related Stories

Stories Featuring Gayle Lemmon

    • 10 Mar 2021
    • HBS Alumni Bulletin

    Sister Soldier

    Re: Gayle Lemmon (MBA 2006)
    • 02 Dec 2016
    • Skydeck

    The Story Behind the Stories

    Re: Gayle Lemmon (MBA 2006)
    • 21 Apr 2015
    • ABC

    The Special Ops Program That Put Woman in Afghanistan Warzones

    Re: Gayle Lemmon (MBA 2006)

More Stories Featuring Gayle Lemmon

 
 
 
ǁ
Campus Map
External Relations
Harvard Business School
Teele Hall
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
Phone: 1.617.495.6890
Email: alumni+hbs.edu
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
  • Terms of Use
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College.