Television: A Novel

by Lauren Rothery

"A glamorous, intriguing novel" (New York Times) about a jaded movie star and the two differently conflicted women in his orbit.

Some people you meet them and you imagine this movie together. The two of you make a kind of movie and then it’s over. Other people, what you imagine isn’t a movie, because it keeps going. It’s television . . . If you can’t see how romantic television is, you’re blind.

An aging, A-list movie star lotteries off the entirety of his mega-million blockbuster salary to a member of the general viewing public before taking up with a much younger model. His non-famous best friend (and often lover) looks on impassively, while recollecting their twenty-odd years of unlikely connection. And an aspiring filmmaker, unknown to them both, labors over a script about best friends and lovers while longing for the financial freedom to make great art.

Told in their alternating, intricately linked perspectives, Television is a funny, philosophically astute novel about phenomenal luck, whether windfall or chance encounter. Like Joan Didion’s classic Play It as It Lays, but speaking to a since irrevocably changed Hollywood, it portrays a culture in crisis and the disparities in wealth, beauty, talent, gender, and youth at the heart of contemporary American life. In this glittering but strange new world, lit up by social media and streaming services—what, if not love, can be counted in your favor?

With plays in chronology, bright, nimble dialogue, and a profoundly modern style, Lauren Rothery’s debut novel is an arresting feat of literary impressionism, and marks the arrival of a significant new talent to the landscape of American fiction.

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary, Literary Fiction, Adult, The United States Of America, Audiobook, Book Club

214 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 2, 2025

Reviews

[Elizabeth Tuttle · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you've ever taken Intro to Sociology, you know Durkheim has a whole thing about balancing integration and regulation - people require a moderate balance of their connections to their community and rules to guide their behavior or else they lose their shit. And few things are more deregulating than wealth and fame. Above all else, this novel romanticizes the regulation consistency provides. What if we rejected the social script of constantly chasing wealth and innovation and instead accepted and valued what (and who) is in front of us?

Television is told from three perspectives: Verity, our sometimes-sober actor lotterying off his salary from a dumb movie franchise he hates, his sometimes-lover best friend Helen, and a young, aspiring screenwriter using her art to reflect on the nature of relationships. The story does not have as much depth as the "Bojack Horseman meets Joan Didion" description would imply and I would have liked a greater differentiation in voice between Verity and Helen, but there's something quite charming about the enduring dynamic between the two friends as they reflect on their own histories and desires. The book also touches on youth/beauty and age gaps, but does so without a moralizing standpoint which I appreciated.

The prose and social observation make this a strong debut, I'll be happy to keep an eye out for future novels by Rothery.

Thank you to NetGalley and Ecco for an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

[Maria Dora · Rating 5 out of 5]

Television is a sharp debut. Lauren Rothery writes with a cool and perceptive voice, capturing the strange mix of intimacy and isolation that comes with fame, art, and ambition. I especially admired the way the story shifts between three distinct voices, each grappling with success and longing in their own way.

At times, the emotional distance of the prose made it a slower read for me, but I think that restraint is part of what Rothery is exploring. The characters disconnect from their own desires and from each other, but I found myself rooting for Helen. If you loved the Apple series “The Studio”, this book is 100% for you.

A bold, stylish first novel from a writer I'll definitely be following.

*this was an ARC kindly provided by Ecco / Harper Collins & NetGalley

[Stefan · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5*, maybe. Liked a lot of it (some great lines, and I enjoyed reading about Verity and Helen), but some choices were strange (why bother with Phoebe’s chapters, for example?). Seemed unfinished, in some ways — it seemed to get shallower as the book progressed. There was a vagueness to the story that was probably meant to be a “stylistic” choice, but ultimately felt more like the author just didn’t know how to write it. Still, an interesting read and I’ll keep my eyes out for the author’s next book.

Full review here: https://civilianreader.com/2026/01/09...

[Misha · Rating 2 out of 5]

(rounded down from 2.25)

I couldn't tell you what this was even about or why we even had Phoebe chapters. A complete mystery with characters who feel really shallow and talk incredibly inauthentically with each other about literally nothing, and there is also not really any plot aside from the lottery concept. I have absolutely no idea what went on, but there were some interesting sentences now and then, so it wasn't a total wash, but close enough, honestly.

[Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this book, but didn't find myself excited to read it. It felt both old and current, the mention of cell phones (called rectangles) was really the only giveaway that it was current day. I really enjoyed Helen and didn't really understand why Phoebe was brought in until the end. Some great scenes, interesting format, and a quick read.

[Delainie · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is not it.

[Tamara · Rating 4 out of 5]

If this book didn’t contain the chapters about Phoebe (they were so jarringly different that they could have been penned by someone else), this would have been a solid five-star read for me and my favorite book of the year (admittedly, it’s only January). Parts of the book are so fantastic that I’m thinking major prize lists, but then…listless Phoebe. Phoebe, wished you’d stayed in France and out of this novel.

[Ruben · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5

Lauren Rothery can certainly write and her characters are sharp, independent thinkers.

The story is about the friendship/relationship between a playwright and a movie star who decides gives to away his salary in a lottery.

Although I found the ideas original, as a novel it left me kind of cold. Themes are fame and looks vs quality... When everything felt read to come together, unfortunately the story just continued plodding along.

[df parizeau · Rating 1 out of 5]

While I appreciate the gall to try to write satire in 2025, Hollywood has been done. This was a total snooze fest with about as much excitement and character as a box of digestive cookies.

[Vincent Scarpa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some scattered thoughts on this one follow. I couldn't make them cohere because I'm achey all over from two vaccines yesterday. Blah blah blah...

**

By the end, I was more or less sold on the project of this novel, which came as something of a surprise considering at the halfway mark I wasn't sure I'd finish it. There's a considerable stretch in the middle where I lost interest, but I was also moving at the time — it's possible I would've been more engaged throughout under more accommodating circumstances.

**

I have to say: Were I Rothery, I would've fought tooth and nail not to have my novel compared to Play it as It Lays on the back cover. Even if my novel were reminiscent of Didion's classic, which — and it's not a fault of Television's — Television just isn't: Rothery's interests seem to me vastly different from Didion's; her style is impressive in its own right but it's not as chiseled or cool or cruel as Didion's; etc.

**

I don't want to give a false impression, though: there is much to be impressed by here — the sentences most of all. I loved this passage, for example:

“Some people you meet them and you imagine this movie together. The two of you make a kind of movie and then it’s over. Other people, what you imagine isn’t a movie, because it keeps going. It’s television. Maybe that won’t make sense to you if you’re twenty and used to watching about three hundred things at one time, but television was when you wanted to tune in every Monday at eight o’clock, week after week, for years. Even after the whole series ended, you’d tune in for the reruns. It wasn't about the plot, you just weren’t tired of them yet. It didn’t need to be sexy. It was romantic. If you can’t see how romantic television is, you're blind.”

**

I was ultimately quite charmed by the relationship Verity and Helen manage to navigate with one another, impossible-seeming though it was at times.

**

Ultimate verdict: I'll keep an eye out for Rothery's next.

[diana · Rating 2 out of 5]

i fear this is a book that says a lot but means very little. i really loved the first few chapters, but as the novel progressed we got more and more into the weeds with characters who never felt real to me (which some may argue is the point, but also there is, i think, a difference between characters who feel real and those who feel realistic that this book fails to parse). i see a lot of reviews calling this a satire--i wouldn't expect that going into it, personally. there's an earnestness here that makes such a label dishonest. i think i understood the point of it at the end: this idea of L.A. and Hollywood culture as romantic, as something you want to come back to again and again, but the reality of the place is not conducive to great artistic pursuit, not when the reality requires raw capital most people will never see, and to gain said capital you must sell out, sell out, sell out. maybe i'm already too burned out on starving artist culture for this to hit me hard in the way all those chapter-ending epithets were meant to. maybe it's just the brain fog.

contemporary lit fic continues to disappoint. uncertain if i'll try the author again.

2/5 stars

[Ava ♡ · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Such moments, apparently, were not to be pursued. I don’t know why, don’t ask me. It didn’t make any sense to me that such moments should so reliably start fires, but my entire adult life supported the affirmative. Who the hell should care if I went on a bender for two and a half weeks? I always came back. Who the hell should care?”

(4.5 ★) Many long passages in this book could exemplify its stunning prose, but to quote them adequately would require quite a bit context- and that, to me, is a sure sign of some really good writing. Lauren Rothery puts a damn good foot forward with this character-driven debut, and I was pleasantly surprised by its ability to live up to the likes of Joan Didion and Bojack Horseman, as mentioned in the summary.

When you meet Verity, you recognize Bojack instantly- they’re both the kind of brooding, self-sabotaging alcoholic man with the charm to get by, but not the self-awareness to make any sort of change. I’m very drawn to characters like this, but was even more attached to Verity specifically because he didn’t frustrate me as much as Bojack does. Helen, too, drew me in with her practicality and casual observations, and together the duo made for about 250 pages worth of very “LA in the 60s”-inspired storytelling. Phoebe was also a beloved character, adding a nostalgic, sort of whimsical narrative that balanced out Verity and Helen’s chaos.

I hadn’t really gotten the Didion comparison until the end, when you look back on what you read and realize it was a glimpse into a few people’s vaguely uninteresting lives, full of thoughts and completely lacking in plot. Understandably, this could be a turn-off for some, but I left with the same feeling I had after “Play It As It Lays” in the sense that you come for the vibe and leave with a better sense of how people are. The vintage sort of cynicism, too, was oddly such a delight to come back to- referring to cell phones as “rectangles,” recurring feelings of hopelessness as an artist, criticizing sellouts, the list goes on. You feel it kind of heavy, in the middle especially, in that Didion-esque way of not trying to be harsh, just honest. Because of this, Television was one of my favorite reads this year and I’ll absolutely be one of the first in line for Rothery’s next novel.

Advanced readers copy provided by NetGalley.

[Daniel Kukwa · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book left me frustrated and disappointed. It opens with the exploration of a fascinating relationship...and one that I could have been happy to explore through the entire novel. But then it breaks off into others characters and more fantastical situations...and the magic (for me at least) was completely lost. I think what makes the heart of this novel special is ultimately undermined.

[My (Lostinfantasybooks) · Rating 2 out of 5]

2 Stars

I was mostly bored reading this book and I have no idea what it was even trying to tell its readers.

[Scott Baxter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Television by Lauren Rothery is a satire of Hollywood and the movie industry. The plot is a little thin and occasionally hard to follow; the highlight is the prose. Rothery’s novel alternates first person chapters between Verity, an aging actor, and Helen, his companion, editor, and sounding board. About a third of the way through the book a screenwriter named Phoebe. There is more plot, but that is all you really need to know.

In some ways the novel owes something to the work of Joan Didion; for example:

Everybody thinks they’re Joan Didion when they write about the flowers or the river (location 490).

There are quite a few references to filmmakers such as Tarkovsky, Bergman, Bunuel, Satyjit Ray, Chaplin, Kurosawa, Scorsese, and others.

And there are many passages commenting on filmmaking I thought worth remembering:

The trouble with having an idea for a screenplay is you have to write the screenplay. A real idea for anything kind of haunts you. Whether you know how to do it or not. I hate writing. But you have to. God help you if you’re one of those people who just talks about writing something (location 1379).

Kurosawa said that even a great director could not make a good movie with a bad script (location 1946).

Let me just end this review by quoting the only time I found the word television.

The two of you make a kind of movie and then it’s over. Other people, what you imagine isn’t a movie, because it keeps going. It’s television. Maybe that won’t make sense to you if you’re twenty and used to watching about three hundred things at one time, but television was when you wanted to tune in every Monday at eight o’clock, week after week, for years. Even after the whole series ended, you’d tune in for the reruns. It wasn’t about the plot, you just weren’t tired of them yet. It didn’t need to be sexy. It was romantic. If you can’t see how romantic television is, you’re blind.

Thanks to the publisher for providing a free copy via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

epub. 256 pgs. 30 September 2025. Scheduled for publication 2 December 2025.

[Paige Lesperance · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was extremely difficult to force myself to finish…I wanted to like it so bad because the first few chapters were engrossing and the two main characters both so interesting in their own ways + I initially loved the idea of a situationship that goes well into middle age (sounds like a nightmare, actually) … but my God I hit somewhere in the middle of this book and suddenly it was like I was reading a foreign language. Sentences stopped making sense and the plot dissolved into literally nothing. 2 stars: 1 for finding characters interesting despite really disliking this book, and 1 because I have faith in this author and I can tell she knows how to write. But I think this one was trying to be a little bit too word vomity…

[Rhea · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredible. I honestly think I’ll just start over and read it again. The writing is exquisite, the story doesn’t matter. The main characters of Verity & Helen are fascinating, and their friendship makes so much sense. There were many passages that rang so true to me. One I particularly loved:
“Something about Gable is even though he was rich and everybody knew it, he could play broke. When he runs out of money in It Happened One Night, he is the perfect mix of unsurprised and irritated. When you are used to money in, money out, it doesn’t startle you to death when the money is gone. It was always going to go. You just wish it could have gone tomorrow.”
The book is full of gems like this, even though it is short. If anything, I wanted more! Very rare these days, for a book to leave me wanting more. Must have been some good editing. I’ll read anything this writer creates, now - she has a fan in me.

[Mayra Kalaora · Rating 4 out of 5]

i loved this book. i didn’t want to put it down. the writing was really awesome. it had many good sentences. it didn’t really go anywhere but i think that’s fine. that’s probably the point. i cannot believe the synopsis begins with “bojack horseman meets joan didion.” who let that happen. i can’t wait to see what else ms. rothery puts out

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

Liked it. People comparing this one way or the other to Joan Didion read a book about LA and the movies and couldn't think of anything original to say about that. They're not wrong either, but try not to think about it. I liked this, but I'm also glad it wasn't much longer. She gets a lot out of the 239 pages. If you're looking for some fiction that isn't a period piece, or ripped from the headlines, or "examining" any "issues", or "experimenting with form", or something something metafiction, this is great.

It kind of reminded me of Douglas Coupland's Generation X, if anything, which probably just means I don't remember anything about that book.

Anyway, read this. It's good. Favorite line, about writing: “You only have a process in retrospect.”

[ari · Rating 2 out of 5]

couple good bits but overall boring

[Ava · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 rounded up: I liked a lot about this (esp its rumination on art & capital) but the Phoebe chapters were pretty unnecessary.

[Lydia Hephzibah · Rating 4 out of 5]

4

setting: USA
rep: n/a

This one is all about the prose and the style rather than the plot, of which there isn't much, but I really enjoyed the writing once I got into the book - took me a few chapters to sink in. the audiobook was well narrated and the three narrators really helped, though I was really put off in Phoebe's first two chapters because anytime she's speaking when she's in France, there's a second voice speaking the French beneath her English and it was completely disorienting

[Kundan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Such a colossal predictable waste of time. I knew I wouldn't enjoy it just from the very fact that it's about Hollywood written by an insider.

It doesn't even have any real plot. The characters don't really grow either. It reads like reality tv show because it feels like the narrator is talking to a camera or an interviewer the whole time. It's as if the author is ambitious and hopes movie studios will pick this up and turn it into a movie or TV show. lol.

There are the nested loops/stacked realities inception mind control programming which is horrendous. Lots of justification of big 30 year age gaps in intimate relationships for example. And references to hookup culture disguised as "polyamory"

The worst part was that there's a literal hypnosis in which a character informally casually hypnotizes a bunch of teen girls or young women and they fall prey to it, and this sort of mass hypnosis is normalized, desensitizing us to it so that we feel it's normal when we read about it in real life or worse when we experience it ourselves..

Please be very careful when you read this book. Before reading, send a command to your subconscious mind, "I don't consent to mind control. I don't consent to being hypnotized."

I am giving it 2 stars instead of 1 though because it does have a few interesting thought provoking lines.

[Callum Erik · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ten years ago I wrote a fanfiction in which one of the characters called the cigarettes he smoked “death sticks” and everytime any of the narrators in this book called a cellphone a “rectangle” I got flashbacks to writing that fanfiction and thinking I was super cool and edgy. At first, I thought it was funny and a good quip since it was the aging characters who said it and I took it as a kind of rejection of technological advancements while still acknowledging their presence. But then the mid-twenties character said it and I lost faith.

There was nothing tying me to this novel or these characters. It felt like watching a sitcom with too many laugh track additions—if the audience has to tell me what’s funny or what’s smart or what’s existential, what is the point of the story? Honestly I was just bored.

And the ending too was pretty bad, but it was just like the rest of the book where things just happened and you could wonder why or you could just keep going without a care.

[Michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

I kept thinking the title of this book was “Freeway.” Mostly cause of the cover but also because of the setting in LA. There was really nothing much that connected it to the actual title, and really nothing much that grabbed my interest. The vaguest of plots, rambling dialogue, and a long and boring screenplay plopped down in the middle. The character who wrote it said she needed an editor and was insecure with her writing. And I felt the same for the actual author.

[Sofia Jeličić · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think a book can be thought of as well-written when you find yourself wishing the author had done some thinks a bit different, but find yourself reading nonetheless. This was exactly what the novel was like for me. It was a quick read, starting off with a very strong premise which becomes more and more abstract as the story unfolds, it felt as though there were gaps appearing throughout the plot (if there even was one), and that it became very difficult to realize what was happening. The characters were brilliant, and you can obviously spot the talent for prose, and the writing itself was very interestingly half-british half-american sounding. However, as I do not live in LA among television people, are they really like this? The dialogue made little sense to me and mostly just seemed nauseatingly pretentious. And I think the whole thing might have worked so much better if it was simply longer and there was more thought given to the very interesting, yet abandoned, story, and less to undecipherable abstractions. The experience of being an artist was very personally portrayed, and was one of the most interesting aspects of it. So I'm very torn on this book, but I can't give it less than four stars because it really did set a certain mood (very reminiscent of Play it As it Lays), and for a first novel it's extremely accomplished. I look forward to more of her work.

[Sydney · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved Television by Lauren Rothery. The characters, their dynamics and banter, it all worked for me. Filled with thought provoking lines, I found myself flying through this book over the course of a night.

Told through three POVs, I felt each character had a clear distinct voice and it was interesting how their perspectives played off one another.

The blurb caught my interest - “Bojack Horseman meets Joan Didion in this smart, sly, and irresistibly stylish debut novel about a jaded movie star and the two differently conflicted women in his orbit”. If it piques your interest too, I’d highly recommend adding this novel to your TBR

Thank you @eccobooks for a copy of this fantastic book in exchange for an honest review

[Dree · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read with LARB book club.

An interesting debut novel, a bit confusing and short, about an older star, his long0-time on again/off again lover and best friend, a young screenwriter, and a few other side characters.

This was not simply another Hollywood novel. It's really about fame, having too much money, and being jaded with success--juxtaposed with being young and trying to make it in a creative field.

I really want to know what the author intended with these character names:
--Verity (male); does he speak truth? Why did she give him that name?
--Helen, as in Helen of Troy? That Verity keeps trying to get back to?
--Phoebe, also a name from Greek mythology, where she is Helen's sister.

I didn't love this novel, but I am definitely curious about what the author will do next. I would also love to see her discuss this.

[James B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thanks to Netgalley and Ecco for the ebook. In a small diner in LA, Helen keeps seeing the most startlingly handsome young man. She eventually talks to him. She eventually takes him home. And there he stays until he becomes one of the biggest actors in the film industry. They stay touchstones in each other’s lives as we follow them through the years including when he comes up with a wild scheme to lottery off his film salary, open to anyone with a ticket stub for the film.

[kozo · Rating 5 out of 5]

I genuinely really liked this book, though I couldn’t exactly put my finger on what exactly it was I liked. There was very little narrative but the characters were interesting enough. In a way, it reminded me of the sparse writing of the 80s, where authors had the ability to experiment in their prose and story telling.