When I picked up Shauna Robinson’s Must Love Books a few months ago, I expected to get swept up in a fluffy romantic story revolving around the publishing world. While I did get all the romance, accompanied by never-ending book-talk, what took me by surprise was the quiet examination of the Gen Z-millennial worker burnout prevalent today and a nuanced representation of living with depression in this age.
Must Love Books is a contemporary novel revolving around Nora Roberts, an editorial assistant working at Parsons Press whose endless love for books predictably leads her to working at a publishing house. But after five years of doing menial work, she starts to realise that the whole idea of a “dream job” has been nothing but a myth. With more and more staff and salary cuts, high rent and her increasing inability to pay her bills, Nora dives into ethically murky waters when she decides to moonlight for a rival publisher to make ends meet. Amidst this stress enters Andrew Santos, a bestselling Parsons author and the current publishing hot shot. Suddenly, everything in Nora’s world starts to crumble.
Romance, despite widely being considered a frivolous genre, has never shied away from incorporating tough topics, but what made this novel stand out was Shauna Robinson’s mature writing which was accompanied by a nuanced yet astute perspective of the present metropolitan culture. There’s a constant undercurrent of loneliness following Nora from the very beginning. Once the chatter of plot-heavy first third of the novel comes to an end and her internal character ruminations begin, it is hard not to catch up on the fact that our main character has depression – something that her job and financial stress aren’t giving her space to deal with, which in turn puts all of our previous assertions about her character up for re-evaluation.
For instance, what was being presented as her fiercely pragmatic attitude towards life suddenly starts coming across as a grim result of living in an expensive 21st century city and daring to follow your dreams with nothing to fall back on.
As Nora takes on another job to pay her bills, her search for an expression of her love towards books never ends. Nora wishes to edit fiction novels, and despite being five years into her job as an editorial assistant, she rarely gets the opportunity to edit a book. The workplace hierarchy and petty office politics places countless obstacles in her way. With no mentors in place, an ever increasing threat of losing her job as staff cut-offs rise, and fast losing all motivation for the publishing world, Nora’s depression starts to take over.
This all-consuming stress of just being able to survive every month is only ever put on pause in scenes with Andrew, the love interest. Unlike many romance novels that showcases its main leads being unrealistically direct and way too forward about their intentions, Shauna Robinson presents Nora and Andrew in an ultra-realistic way. Their conversations – the getting-to-know-you, slight tip-toeing around getting more information out of the person – their body language around each other, every detail of their burgeoning romance felt realistic and a natural progression of their characters. And despite technically knowing that these two would end up together, the professional boundaries and figuring out what could possibly be a conflict of interest kept the tension in their conversations alive.
Andrew’s eternal optimism is wonderfully contrasted with Nora’s internal cynic, but neither fall into the grumpy-sunshine trope. Robinson resists turning them into a stereotype and instead gives us an empathetic depiction of two adults living on opposite ends of the financial spectrum, but both dealing with loneliness in their own way. Even from a narrative perspective, Andrew works as a great love interest as his positive yet practical outlook towards life worked as the perfect foil to showcase Nora’s increasing depression.
The passages of Nora just trying to not think and struggling to see the beauty in life accurately brought out the melancholy of those scenes, but often those scenes were followed by an interaction with Andrew, the only character, whose words were managing to get through to her. The non-glamourous representation of a love interest simply trying to be supportive without turning into a saviour was another welcome surprise.
Even after sketching out these complex topics with the depth that they deserved, Robinson makes sure that Must Love Books is by no means a downer. It has its humorous moments, and while there were some romance readers who were disappointed with the romance in question getting the sub-plot treatment, I feel that it was that exact decision which made the romance so compelling. As Nora is quickly burning out, Andrew is her only respite from stresses of life (even though, he is a big part of her job), and their conversations work as her main point of reflection. While for Andrew, after moving to a new city where he has no friends and is mainly surrounded by people older than him at his workplace, talking to Nora and finding intelligent, like-minded company in her works as an obvious point of relaxation.
Robinson showcased the simplicity of an adult relationship in all its mature, peaceful glory and incorporating that effortlessly into the increasingly unstable house of cards that is the plot, shows confidence in her writing skills and a great understanding of how to construct a narrative. Must Love Books is a strong debut and a remarkable addition to the contemporary genre.
Shivani Yadav is a fashion and film writer.
Featured image: Tangerine Newt / Unsplash