Books › You Exist Too Much
You Exist Too Much
320 pages
A sharp, fragmented portrait of a young woman trying to outrun her own desires and cultural ghosts through reckless love.
What it feels like
Reading this novel feels like sitting in a dimly lit bar with a brilliant, self-destructive friend who is finally telling you the whole truth. Told in sharp, episodic vignettes that flash across time and continents, the narrative moves at a brisk, restless pace, mirroring the protagonist's own desperate search for an anchor. The prose is unsparing and wry, cutting through the heavy atmosphere of cultural displacement and mother-daughter trauma with flashes of dark humor and raw vulnerability. It is an intensely intimate, turbulent reading experience that sits heavy in the chest. This book will deeply satisfy readers who love messy, complicated queer protagonists and stories that explore the painful, chaotic space between who we are and who we are expected to be.
- Mood
- restless
- intimate
- turbulent
- melancholic
- Tone
- confessional
- wry
- vulnerable
- unsparing
- Pace
- brisk
- Themes
- love addiction · mother-daughter wounds · cultural displacement · self-sabotage · queer longing
- The writing
- Written in sharp, episodic vignettes that feel like intimate, breathless confessions laced with dry humor.
- The arc
- Traces a path from chaotic, self-destructive avoidance to a fragile, hard-won willingness to face the roots of her trauma.
- Who it's for
- Readers who devour stories about messy, complicated queer women navigating the painful intersections of cultural expectation and self-destructive desire.
Content notes
- addiction
- infidelity
- homophobia
- eating disorders
- emotional abuse
About the book
A novel of self-discovery following a Palestinian-American girl as she navigates queerness, love addiction and a series of tumultuous relationships' The Millions, One of the Most Anticipated Books of the Year
Told in vignettes that flash between the US and the Middle East, Zaina Arafat's powerful debut novel traces her protagonist's progress from blushing teen to creative and confused adulthood.
In Brooklyn, she moves into an apartment with her first serious girlfriend and tries to content herself with their comfortable relationship. Soon, her longings, so closely hidden during her teenage years, explode out into reckless romantic encounters and obsessions with other people which results in her seeking unconventional help to face her past traumas and current demons.
Opening up the fantasies and desires of one young woman caught between cultural, religious and sexual identities, You Exist Too Much is a captivating story charting two of our most intense longings - for love, and a place to call home.
Description from Open Library.
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