Just By Looking at Him
The ONLY book you need to read this LGBTQ+ Pride season, from a hilarious new voice
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- 3,49 €
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- 3,49 €
Description de l’éditeur
'A horny romp that makes you think, laugh, and feel. O'Connell is one of my favourite writers' MONICA HEISEY, author of Really Good, Actually
'A very funny novel about falling for a fantasy and finding love for one's own self' MELISSA BRODER, author of The Pisces
'Funny, horny, heartbreaking' CAROLINE O'DONOGHUE, author of Promising Young Women
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Eliott is a TV writer with a perfect-penised boyfriend. He's living the dream.
But behind the glossy veneer, Elliott's life is chaos. His boss is hateful, he's cheating on his boyfriend and his cerebral palsy makes him feel like gay Shrek. Dream? More like a nightmare.
When the face you show the world doesn't match reality, how do you know who you are? Elliott needs to find out, and quick, or it will be a long limp towards redemption.
A hilarious, sexy, ground-breaking debut novel about the intersection of queerness and disability, and discovering who you really are.
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What readers are saying about Just By Looking at Him
'Darkly funny and poignant'
'Such a fresh take . . . I was gripped from the first page'
'Brutally honest, funny and poignant look at modern life through the lens of disability'
'This book is honest, hilarious, and raw . . . I loved literally every character'
'The author has such a strong voice and has created in Eliot a character that I will not soon forget . . . I found myself laughing out loud'
'Reads like your favorite whip- smart sitcom everyone looks forward to at the end of the day'
'One of the funniest books I have ever read'
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
O'Connell navigates internalized homophobia and ableism in his hysterical debut novel (after the memoir I'm Special: And Other Lies We Tell Ourselves), a ripsnorter set in Los Angeles. Elliott, the protagonist, introduces readers to his "perfect" boyfriend, Gus, whom he increasingly resents. After almost six years together, the two are in a rut of ordering takeout, drinking natural wine, and having dissociative sex. Elliott is living with cerebral palsy, and despite having a flashy job writing for television, he can't help but think "modern life is hell." After an eyebrow-raising story from his boss involving hiring a sex worker, Elliott sets off on a trip of self-sabotage turned self-discovery, as he probes his relationships with sex and his body, alcohol, disability ("I work very hard to appear palatable, easy to digest, the crostini of disability"), and his father. (Some of this may sound familiar to fans of O'Connell's Netflix series, Special.) Here, O'Connell's revelatory and charming humor adds dimension to a character who is unapologetic about his spiraling behavior despite claiming to know better. O'Connell leaves nothing on the table, and the result reads like a zippy, traffic-dodging trip up the 101 on a blinding afternoon.
