JOSH’S PICK

Presented as a series of emails between an embittered writer, recently MeTood, and an actress beyond her prime. Initially theyre at each others throats, but what unravels is a shared quest for sobriety, rehabilitation, and healing. Despentes doesnt pull punches. Reading this was therapy. -JC

The French novel taking the world by storm: an ultracontemporaryDangerous Liaisons about sex, feminism, and addiction.

Dear Dickhead,
I read your post on Insta. Youre like a pigeon shitting on my shoulder as you flap past. Its shitty and unpleasant. Waah, waah, waah, Im a pissy little pantywaist, no one loves me so I whimper like a Chihuahua in the hope someone will notice me. Congratulations: youve got your fifteen minutes of fame! You want proof? Im writing to you.

Oscar is a B-list novelist in his forties. He used to be an alcoholic and a cokehead, but now he keeps himself busy by ranting on social media. When Rebecca, an actress whose looks he insulted, sends him an angry email, they strike up a combative correspondenceat the very moment that Oscar is accused of sexual harassment by his former publicist. What ensues is a no-holds-barred conversation about life under the patriarchy, and above all about addictionto drugs, to alcohol, to the internet, to rage.

Virginie Despentes, the celebrated author of King Kong Theory, has written her breakthrough book: a Dangerous Liaisons for our time. We follow Rebecca and Oscar as they develop an unlikely friendship and argue over questions of right and wrong in a cityPariswhere pleasure, excess, and freedom rule the day, or used to. Dear Dickhead is a guns-blazing novel about a culture that makes men and women sick, and about how the search for feeling leaves us addicted to what makes us feel. The result is a provocative and unmissable book from the author hailed by The Guardian as Frances rock and roll Zola.

Hardcover | 304 pages | 5.38″ x 8.25″