I'm not a huge lover of contemporary romances. I've been on a bit of a kick recently and figured I'd pick up The Kiss Quotient as a means of just finding something else to breeze through. From the very first line-- I kid you not, because the very first line is hilarious-- I was absolutely hooked. Seriously, I finished the book and then immediately began a reread.
The book follows Stella, a woman on the spectrum who loves her job (in economics and statistics) and her routines, who hires a male escort with the hopes of learning how to become "good at" sex. The escort, Michael, of course, becomes the love interest in a reverse Pretty Woman story that could have fallen into SO MANY bad traps and avoids most all of them.
The two voices of Michael and Stella are very distinct, even though the story is told in third person; for the most part, perspectives alternate chapters (though it's not as clear cut as that as the story goes on). I was deeply concerned about the representation of neurodiversity and in the first chapter, became even more anxious about the representation of Stella's own view of being autistic and how it seemed to check certain boxes one might think of right away when thinking of the autism spectrum. The signaling in the beginning is meant to be quite overt, but after that, it is thoughtful and believable, with very real negotiations of Stella's emotional time and energy. Similarly, I was concerned from the get go about "characters having sex for money and then developing something real out of that and the power dynamics of money" and that too was dealt with nicely, given the shifting of their relationship and their terms each time they meet and the fact that they don't really "get it on" until certain things have been established as a baseline.
The writing was witty and adorable-- at times, I felt as sick to my stomach as Stella (when she meets Michael's family for the first time) and as elated as her as well (when she discovers the joys of yoga pants). Perhaps it has to do with my own experiences, but I found her perspectives extremely relatable. Even the inevitable "drama happens and the two break apart" bit towards the end was handled well and truly played upon the struggles that each character was handling and that the truth of their issues could be so handily resolved. There was never any shaming of Stella because of neurodiversity (I would have stopped reading immediately)-- only her own insecurities and how she examines them.
It was a sweet love story (with quite a few sexually explicit bits, so don't think the fluffy description means that it is light on representation of physical intimacy-- whether that is your bag or not) that really swept me away... so much so that I finished the book in a matter of two hours and then immediately picked it back up to reread it the next day. Would definitely recommend!
The book follows Stella, a woman on the spectrum who loves her job (in economics and statistics) and her routines, who hires a male escort with the hopes of learning how to become "good at" sex. The escort, Michael, of course, becomes the love interest in a reverse Pretty Woman story that could have fallen into SO MANY bad traps and avoids most all of them.
The two voices of Michael and Stella are very distinct, even though the story is told in third person; for the most part, perspectives alternate chapters (though it's not as clear cut as that as the story goes on). I was deeply concerned about the representation of neurodiversity and in the first chapter, became even more anxious about the representation of Stella's own view of being autistic and how it seemed to check certain boxes one might think of right away when thinking of the autism spectrum. The signaling in the beginning is meant to be quite overt, but after that, it is thoughtful and believable, with very real negotiations of Stella's emotional time and energy. Similarly, I was concerned from the get go about "characters having sex for money and then developing something real out of that and the power dynamics of money" and that too was dealt with nicely, given the shifting of their relationship and their terms each time they meet and the fact that they don't really "get it on" until certain things have been established as a baseline.
The writing was witty and adorable-- at times, I felt as sick to my stomach as Stella (when she meets Michael's family for the first time) and as elated as her as well (when she discovers the joys of yoga pants). Perhaps it has to do with my own experiences, but I found her perspectives extremely relatable. Even the inevitable "drama happens and the two break apart" bit towards the end was handled well and truly played upon the struggles that each character was handling and that the truth of their issues could be so handily resolved. There was never any shaming of Stella because of neurodiversity (I would have stopped reading immediately)-- only her own insecurities and how she examines them.
It was a sweet love story (with quite a few sexually explicit bits, so don't think the fluffy description means that it is light on representation of physical intimacy-- whether that is your bag or not) that really swept me away... so much so that I finished the book in a matter of two hours and then immediately picked it back up to reread it the next day. Would definitely recommend!