The Troubled Hot Guy Canon
What to Read in February
Hello!
My second novel, The End of Romance, came out on Tuesday—wild words to write. It got a lovely review from the New York Times’s Alexandra Jacobs, and more in Time, Bustle, and BookPage. I’m taking it on the road this month: Brooklyn on Feb. 11th, Cincinnati on Feb. 20th, and Denver on Feb. 26th, plus events for my translation of Rodrigo Hasbún’s The Invisible Years in Houston on Feb. 27th and Dallas on Feb. 28th. Come see me!
The End of Romance is an anti-romance romance, which is to say it’s the tale of a woman who furiously resists falling in love but cannot help herself. It’s also a philosophical inquiry into the future of the heterosexual marriage plot—a State of the Straight Union, if you will. In its honor, I thought I would supply you with a list of my own favorite anti-romances. Happy Valentine’s Day!
I have to start with Jeffrey Eugenides’s The Marriage Plot, without which The End of Romance would not exist. A love triangle, set at Brown, about a girl who reads too much French theory, then tries to apply it to her relationship with a Troubled Hot Guy and makes a mess of her life—catnip and devastation! I read The Marriage Plot approximately twelve minutes after I graduated from Brown, and just remembering what it did to me then makes me vaguely sick to my stomach (compliment) now. Also, anyone who, like me, feels nothing toward Shane Hollander and everything toward Ilya Rozanov understands the appeal of Troubled Hot Guys.
