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A review by erincampbell87
Milostné pletky Nathaniela P. by Adelle Waldman
5.0
I pictured the main character as the male protagonist from the 40 Days of Dating website, which perhaps illustrates how timely this story really is. It's a quick, thoughtful read that's both cathartic and anxiety-producing for a twenty-something woman like me. This book interested me not only because it was a brief behavioral study of people in my exact demographic, but because I don't date, so I observe these behaviors in the real world the way I observed the characters in the book - from the outside. The novel opens with a George Eliot quote, and it's fitting, because it reads like a modern take on introspective love stories of the past, that turn a critical lens on a specific demographic and studies their interactions with each other. But its star is the modern anti-hero.
Nate is a typical cerebral guy, raised by a feminist mother to flourish in an artistic world. Guys like this are kind of wolves in sheep's clothing - they have a progressive, equality-infused worldview, but they can't seem to apply that to the way they act on a micro level, in their personal lives. Or maybe the assume because they're an artistic, liberal anti-bro, they're already gaining points in the dating world without having to put in any of the actual work to reflect their beliefs in their personalities. They're like the hipster version of the nice guy - an angry Seth Cohen or Zach Braff maybe.
Most reviews of this book say that Hannah is the first woman Nate meets who he perceives as his intellectual equal. I think it's probably true that this is the first woman he's willing to accept as his intellectual equal, or maybe who wasn't afraid to keep herself firmly planted on his intellectual level, whereas the other women he dated withered and gave in underneath the pressure of his moody, contrary personality. One of the problems with men like this, as suggested by Nate's inability to understand the women around him, is that they can't or won't accept that women often have similar objectives in relationships, or that women want the same thing out of relationships. The conflict this constantly creates, as men who stop wondering whether the problem is their own and keep racing from girl to girl as if to somehow erase the problems of their past relationships, is the focus of this novel. It's not a plot-driven novel, it's a character study. We're meant to see shreds of ourselves in the characters and wonder how we'd react in their lives. Adelle Waldman is so perceptive and masterful at inhabiting her characters and predicting what they'll do next that the portrait is so realistic, biting and engaging, especially for people who fall in the demographic she's skewering.
Nate is a typical cerebral guy, raised by a feminist mother to flourish in an artistic world. Guys like this are kind of wolves in sheep's clothing - they have a progressive, equality-infused worldview, but they can't seem to apply that to the way they act on a micro level, in their personal lives. Or maybe the assume because they're an artistic, liberal anti-bro, they're already gaining points in the dating world without having to put in any of the actual work to reflect their beliefs in their personalities. They're like the hipster version of the nice guy - an angry Seth Cohen or Zach Braff maybe.
Most reviews of this book say that Hannah is the first woman Nate meets who he perceives as his intellectual equal. I think it's probably true that this is the first woman he's willing to accept as his intellectual equal, or maybe who wasn't afraid to keep herself firmly planted on his intellectual level, whereas the other women he dated withered and gave in underneath the pressure of his moody, contrary personality. One of the problems with men like this, as suggested by Nate's inability to understand the women around him, is that they can't or won't accept that women often have similar objectives in relationships, or that women want the same thing out of relationships. The conflict this constantly creates, as men who stop wondering whether the problem is their own and keep racing from girl to girl as if to somehow erase the problems of their past relationships, is the focus of this novel. It's not a plot-driven novel, it's a character study. We're meant to see shreds of ourselves in the characters and wonder how we'd react in their lives. Adelle Waldman is so perceptive and masterful at inhabiting her characters and predicting what they'll do next that the portrait is so realistic, biting and engaging, especially for people who fall in the demographic she's skewering.