Oh, this was delicious.

The shifting perspectives, all within the confines of a grad student's MFA thesis, serve as a brilliant tool to unfold this winding story about the (un)raveling of a marriage. The book had me hooked instantly, and after ripping through it left me gasping at the end, jolting at the stuttered finale. I loved this one, and very much look forward to Adrian's next.

Simone was not only an admired professor at Edwards University but also a celebrated writer, known for both her brilliant lectures and her captivating beauty. Her life, seemingly perfect, was riddled with complexities that only a few could see.
Her husband, Ethan—a Tag-a-long adjunct professor whose once-famous novel still echoed in literary circles—was utterly devoted to Simone. His love bordered on worship, yet cracks began to appear when the department’s administrative assistant started showing an interest in him.

Meanwhile, Simone started to develop an unexpectedly close relationship with one of her advisees. This young protégé, flattered by Simone's attention, began to see their interactions as something more profound than simple mentorship. Inspired by the unfolding events, the advisee quietly began to document their encounters, crafting a narrative that offered an intimate look at the shifting dynamics between teacher, mentor, and student.

Intrigue, love, possession - this is a fantastic story that I would love to see in film.
#emilyadrian #littlebrownandcompany

At first, I wasn't sure of the conceit of this book - it's presented as an MFA student's thesis, but is really a novel about a marriage. For probably the first half, a little voice in my head was saying, "This feels real and true and is laugh-out-loud funny in parts and I love it, but wouldn't this have been just as good -- if not better? -- if that narrator's voice didn't keep intruding? But THEN something suddenly clicked and there is a scene where the narrator is being told in a workshop that the story suffers from a POV problem, which is very meta, and I realized that actually it didn't suffer from a POV problem at all, and this additional layer of this somewhat intrusive POV IS the voice that makes the novel. Magic! The ending is so satisfying. This novel reminded me a lot of Rufi Thorpe's work, and she's one of my favourites, so this was a slam dunk for me. I read it in a single day and immediately ordered the author's other two adult books, and I'll probably read her YA, too. Slam. Dunk. I'll be recommending this all over the interwebs, if the socials still exist by then, when it comes out. Read if you need an escape from your own life for a while, which, given everything that's happening, you probably do. I know I did. Thank you, Emily Adrian! Quirky-litfic forever!