Raw and at times brutal in its grotesque descriptions and honest writing, at times I wanted to look away from the story and give up, and yet I still found myself swallowing down every chapter that left me with a bitter aftertaste when I finally finished.
The story had a rocky start for me, and I didn’t start truly stop tabbing every single moment of awkward writing or excess dialogue until the second half of the story. At some point between Jhanvi’s spiraling out, and Henry being a flaccid man, I just couldn’t look away. That could partially be contributed to the fact my power is still out because of Hurricane Beryl. I am at a loss for entertainment now. (Fuck you, weather)
I did enjoy the descriptions, they had my stomach twisting, masterfully so.

“…but she plunged onward, blindly, licking and slobbering, running her tongue and throat over it as he moaned….”

“Her wooden dick sawed mechanically into and out of him…”

“…with her hairy skin puddling underneath her on the sheets and her sad, lank hair static-charged and standing straight out, framing her boxy face…”

I will say this is where Kanakia excels. At writing in such a way, the reader feels dirty and gross the vivid descriptions capturing the scene and conveying a sense of unease and rawness.

“She went to his bed, got naked, climbed under the covers—a man with long, thin hair and two blobs of subcutaneous fat on his chest.”

It reminded me of when I read Tell Me I’m Worthless by Alison Rumfitt, the same level of grossness to the writing style. I wished the rest of the writing continued in that same level.
I also did enjoy how gender dysphoria was brought up, and the overall discussion of what Jhanvi would do to be a woman. I lost the quote and wish I had tabbed it but there is a moment where she mentions wanting to suck the essence of being a woman out of her housemates, and if that isn’t gender envy and the struggle of trans people, I don’t know what is. It was so raw and honest, and my enby was like: yes that.

The plot was far different then I expected, and instead felt it was more aptly as one woman’s downward spiral, and the lengths she will go to feel desired and get what she wants.
A huge issue I have with this story, is that it doesn’t feel at all anything like the back cover promises. When I am recommended a book that is marketed to me as “darkly funny”, I expect to at least chuckle. Perhaps a weak smile. I don’t expect pages and pages of sexual assault, bigotry, racism, and more. There are no content warnings, I went into this full raw dogging it, and felt totally off balance. I got through it, but I like to be able to know what I’m getting into.
This story didn’t feel darkly funny, in fact it felt incredibly depressing, full of triggers, (There is SO MUCH SEXUAL ASSAULT) and more akin to a horror story than anything else. (Tempted to shelf it as horror) There are entire pages devoted to chunks and chunks of dialogue, where it doesn’t feel like a real conversation, and instead people for some reason having these obscure and deep observations about the world around them. Jhanvi spent most of the time talking at people, and I was so confused why the other person would just listen and respond. Quite frankly the fact she just moved in and started living there, read to me as everyone else was justified in wanting her to go. And it's not like she didn’t have a job and a place already back home, she did, until she ditched it all. It read nearly like BPD to me, and I was surprised her mental health was never brought up. (Girl needs ALL THE THERAPY!)
Half of this book would be lost if Jhanvi spent less time telling others how ugly and worthless she was. (The red flag is the size of a small country now.)

“’I’m disgusting. I’m a monster. I’m like something from a nightmare.’”

Another part of the blurb where it says: “Soon, she has to choose between doing what’s right and doing what’s right for her.” I would say that is an inherently false statement, Jhanvi right from page one doesn’t do the right thing, and that trend continues the whole story and even at the end continues her own self-described evil. She also doesn’t do what’s right for her either, self-destructivity was maxed out.
It takes a bold author to write a book with not only a terrible main character, but with a full set of characters, all truly bad people. Jhanvi is billed as somehow being a “sensitive” heroine, and I don’t like how this is being pitched as questioning the promise of “found family”. Found family at its essence, comes from queer culture. Of your own family rejecting you and CHOOSING others near you who are good and kind, and who love you. The whole premises of this story where instead it’s just a group of people together only because they’re roommates and sleeping together, and have money tangled up in each other’s business, is not at all what a found family is. You can’t critique and question the whole trope and promise when you’re not even establishing what the correct baseline for found family is. Showing up and forcibly moving into someone else’s home is not at all how you come to be in a found family. (Though a point could be made that Henry, Audrey, and Katie are a found family, though it reads more as just a close friendship or poly) I would say it is more accurate to white people being granola, a hippie free love lifestyle that usually is selective to those above a certain salary bracket and who bill themselves as being liberal and accepting.
Jhanvi is an abusive person that does horrible things to the people around her, and also experiences abuse throughout the story. She somehow manages to make these all-knowing comments about other people, as if she magically knows everything about them, yet also continues to incredibly childish and immature, as well as well. Horrible.
Jhanvi was hard to stomach, manipulative at best, a self-victimizer at worst, she truly was not lying when she said she had a “white soul”.

“She might look dark and look marginalized, but she had the soul of a skinny white girl…”

This was hard to read.

“…’but I’m literally the most marginalized person here.’”

If her race wasn’t mentioned, it would be easy to read her as being white, just because she is so desperate to victimize herself. It reminds me of white queer people who finally are able to claim a marginalized card when they come out and use it whenever they can. She constantly throws tantrums, abuses the people around her, and is a general villain.
Jhanvi meets Toni, and right off the bat she picks apart her appearance, touching her this way and that.

“Look, your facial hair is sparse.’ She touched Toni’s face, ran her thumb over the bristles on the chin. ‘It won’t cost you nearly as much as it’ll cost me. Start doing lasering, invest in that…You’ve got that boyish frame that’s a nice basic start—no fat to take away, just fat to add, and that thin chest will look good even with small breasts.’”

The red flags aren’t flags anymore, they’re neon.
Jhanvi also repeatedly makes physical contact with Roshie, without consent, even after being told no.

“Jhanvi pounced, wrapping her arms around her friend…Roshie fought free and whirled around…’Don’t do that!’ Roshie waved a finger.”


It’s not far off to say even the way every woman was described was inherently misogynistic in nature. I can’t remember the last time I read a book where every single woman’s appearance was picked apart and described in such detail, down to their height. Actually, yes, I can. There’s a reason I stay away from books written by cis men, they usually describe women’s heights down to the inch, always giving them perfect bodies and even detailing their breasts in such a way I feel dirty after reading.

“She was short, maybe 5’3 or so, and her brown hair was perpetually in a ponytail. She looked like a gymnast, slight at first glance, almost elfin, but her arms and thighs and back were knotted muscle.”

That’s not to say every woman is given this treatment, Roshie is instead repeatedly talked about in terms of her acne scars and “pugnacious” appearance. It isn’t a difficult leap to see how different the treatment and appearance white women vs. BIPOC women are given, though how it lands at times feels almost too far to the other side of the coin and instead sways into nearly feeling stereotypical in nature. Roshie’s personality and anger is so frequently brought up, as if she isn’t allowed the same space to be a boss bitch like the white women are.
It is difficult to say if it was intentional on Kanakia’s part or not, I haven’t read any of her other books, so I am unable to say if this is solely contained to this book or not. Though even Roshie is described as “…her little fists swinging…” because heaven forbid every other woman besides Jhanvi be skinny and perfect. Even at the end, Jhanvi is unable to see her (Roshie) as beautiful.

“…unshaven pits and arms—the Persian girl’s curse, she was hairy as fuck. Not beautiful, never beautiful, never that.”

There were moments I was confused about terms or wording, and when leggings kept being used as clothing descriptions, I realized it was because the author is likely from a far older generation then me. I have never heard anyone describe another person as a “sex friend”, and moment like that I wish were adjusted to actually make sense. (Online sexting, roleplay, fuck buddy, one sided online relationship, like there’s options, people!)


Truly one of the things missing was more stringent editing. There was such an excess of exclamation points, em dashes, and ellipses. I counted on one page, there was 4 em dashes. It’s not necessary, and others were composed of less letters and actual words and instead I stared at a page nearly full of ellipses. Other times I would find myself broken out of reading because there were SO many exclamation points. (5 on page 56 alone) Sentences in a row that lost their emotional impact and instead landed weakly, a period would have sufficed.

This is the first book I’ve read by Naomi Kanakia, and at this point I am unsure if I would read anything else by her. I would actually read a critical essay from her; her writing feels like it would be strong in that regard.

It's difficult to recommend a book that was nothing like I expected or was prepared for. Personally, I would not recommend this book, unless you enjoy this type of adult fiction. It is not to my tastes, and I really don’t think enough happened in it, most of it was devoted to Jhanvi having long conversations and complaining about the world or relationships but it feels like nothing actually happened. (Growth, not found.) Jhanvi is also completely aware of this, yet still doesn’t quite get it.

“Perhaps this ecosystem needed Jhanvi’s evilness, just as the bay needed the scuttling crabs to consume the dead fish. Without her, there would be no cleansing scorn to clear away the bullshit and

Jhanvi just continues to make these deep and out of place observations as if she is somehow still both above and beneath everyone else and yet still hates herself, and the friends seem to accept her, at least Roshie does. It reads as insincere and hollow, an intentional point I’d like to think. Jhanvi doesn’t become a better person, doesn’t leave the situation and the people she’s been abusing the whole book (and who have abused her), and instead stays and I can only shudder to think what will come of her continued presence in their lives.

Thank you to the publisher for this arc