Hello, Limerence

by Momo Yamaguchi

For fans of Asako Yuzuki and Fleabag, an audacious, unhinged debut following the major humiliations and minor triumphs of an overworked, undersexed young woman in Tokyo who must save herself from the hazards of her own lust, obsession, and delusion.

limerence. [li-mer-uhns] noun

the state of being obsessively infatuated with someone, usually accompanied by delusions of or a desire for an intense romantic relationship with that person; e.g., her limerence lasted for around three months before she actually met him

Mika is about to turn 25, and all she has to show for it is a soul-sucking office job and a terminal case of virginity. Between unwanted advances from co-workers and subway commuters, and love-bombing from unappealing fuckboys, Mika’s ready to explode. Her only therapeutic outlet is her imagination, which manifests in a series of comically violent and horny fantasies.

Determined to change her fate, and with the encouragement of Nana, her certified “Hot Girl” best friend, Mika loses half of her virginity to Tyler, a Japanese-American boy with an allergy to commitment. The other half is taken by a man with a drawer full of red flags, all while Mika indulges in fantasies of women much to her titillation and confusion.

Caught in a love(less) triangle, Mika also must weather a mysterious outbreak spurred by the unhygienic bathroom practices of white male westerners. Will she emerge from quarantine a new woman? Or, spurred by a reunion with an estranged friend, can she shift her life in a new direction? Could this be yet again limerence, or might it be the beginning of something a bit less one-sided?

Scathingly funny, delightfully profane, and surprisingly heartfelt, Hello, Limerence is a story for the unloved and the unhinged—a madcap spin through the frenzy of one woman’s desire.

Genres: Fiction, Literary Fiction, Contemporary, Japan, Audiobook, Humor, LGBT

224 pages, Hardcover

First published June 2, 2026

About the author

Momo Yamaguchi was born in Tokyo, educated in the US and Japan, and is currently based in London.

Reviews

[emma]

limerence. [li-mer-uhns] noun

the state of being obsessively infatuated with someone, usually accompanied by delusions of or a desire for an intense romantic relationship with that person; e.g., her limerence lasted for around three months before she actually met him

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)

[Rachel Louise Atkin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nothing particularly wrong with this book I’m just so sick of reading about girls lusting over dickhead men and being treated like absolute shit. I’ve lived it and would rather not experience it again. I enjoyed the pandemic part of this book which was like the last 25% and all the bits about the relationship fizzling out were quite good to read. But I didn’t really care about the subject matter of the rest of it.

[Carm · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you to NetGalley and Mariner Books for providing an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest feedback.

Man... this book is a whole vibe. Mika is 24 years old with a soul-sucking corporate job and a “love life” that consists of unwanted advances at work, being groped on the train and being strung along by Tai, a Japanese-American expat who keeps her at arm’s length (and doesn’t know how condom sizing works), and Jojo, a man-whore who hands out toothbrushes like he’s the oral care aisle at CVS (but can’t locate the human female clitoris). In the case of the latter two prospects, she’s desperately infatuated. Completely obsessed. Hence the title. Her inner monologues are horny and violent. Harrowing and vapid. At any given moment, I wasn’t sure if I loved her or hated her. It’s still unclear. Reply hazy. Ask again later.

Every relationship in this book is toxic and every character is living in a vacuum, dripping with venom or inadequacy or obliviousness... or hell, all three. Somewhere toward the middle of the book, it takes a weird turn. We’re treated to a parallel universe version of Covid… but it’s violent, explosive diarrhea. Then we logically segue into coronalingus, job applications, bisexuality and tasty, tasty pasta recipes. Well… one tasty pasta recipe.

This was kind of a blast. Mika is infuriating. She feels superior to everyone while somehow having an inferiority complex. She thinks being in one’s early thirties is equivalent to having one foot in the grave. She pushes everyone away… unless she actually should. Then she’s like a dog doing tricks for scraps. But honestly… I kinda loved this. 🤷🏻‍♂️

[Kate O'Shea · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5

Sadly this wasn't for me. I'm either the wrong age or the wrong generation or just the wrong reader.

The synopsis sounded interesting and I usually enjoy YA type books but this one bored me for most of the repetitive storyline.

Mika is a young woman doing a dull job who falls in love/lust with the wrong men. She overestimated her attractiveness to the opposite and same sex and to prospective employers. She then stays in love/lust with the men even though they are not interested and regularly declares herself over them even though she isn't.

If you repeat this plus add some graphic sex scenes, a few strange recipes and a lot of moaning about everything wrong with her life then you have the 212 pages of Hello, Limerence.

I still have to figure out what the difference between limerence and obsession/crush/unrequited love is. I honestly can't see it.

This book may be okay for late teen/twenties age group but I was bored and skim read a lot of the later pages.

Thankyou to Netgalley and Faber & Faber for the digital review copy.

[Miriam · Rating 1 out of 5]

How else am I supposed to rate a book that contains the word "shooketh". In 2026.

[liv (≧▽≦) · Rating 4 out of 5]

The girls who get it, get it!
This was so much fun / very funny. I wasn't expecting to be so charmed, but this book had me giggling out-loud. Mika is a little bit delulu but being stuck in her head with such a vivid imagination is what makes this book so fun! Don't take it too seriously and you'll have a blast! I particularly loved the rants about how dull capitalism makes life, being a Gen Z-er, I am certainly the target for this book and Yamaguchi absolutely nailed the descriptions of the drab boring ultimately worthless life lived under this system. I related to much of Mika's thoughts and actions, truely felt seen by this fictional character.

[Abigaëlle · Rating 5 out of 5]

En réalité ça serait plutôt du 4,75/5 (la relou du coin bonjour) parce qu’il y a un passage un peu dystopique que j’ai un peu moins apprécié que le reste.
Mais sinon…. Génialissime !
Mika est la représentation même de nos questionnements, nos insécurités, notre recherche de soi. Ses raisonnements et ses actions, que l’on trouve parfois stupides, sont rassurants, puisqu’ils peuvent tout à fait faire écho aux nôtres parfois parce qu’on aime, qu’on espère, souvent, tout aussi stupidement. (Pas sûre que cette phrase soit claire)
C’est crue, c’est vrai, ça ne plairait pas à tout le monde. Pourtant ce côté tranchant correspond tout à fait aux vingtenaires actuels et leur approche de l’amour, du sexe, de l’amitié. Elle aborde aussi la question du travail, du patriarcat et du racisme en imaginant des petits scénarios vengeance absolument satisfaisant à lire.
Bref c’est décalé et honnêtement c’est une lecture qui fait du bien.

[Mai H.]

Japanuary TBR

📱 Thank you to NetGalley and Mariner Books

[jay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Honestly enjoyed this. Mika is a refreshing narrator and very realistic. The ending felt very sudden, and the plot jumped all over the place, but it was still a good read. Thanks to NetGalley for this eArc in exchange for an honest review.

[V · Rating 1 out of 5]

As a reader, I personally don't mind having an unhinged female main character. In this case, Mika. Especially since the blurb promised something more frontal or even vulgar. To be honest, the blurb itself was the reason I picked up this book. I was expecting obsession and delusion from her.

But unfortunately, the more I read, the more I felt like this book didn't really have a clear plot or direction, so it didn't match the blurb. I don't mind book that aren't very plot-driven, but here it felt like Mika spent most of the time just talking and yapping about herself and her own thoughts, ignoring what really happens around her. Everything was too focused on her opinions and her inner monologues. Until that became too much and felt unnecessary. The story didn't really go anywhere. I wan't even sure what actually happened in that chapters. This made the book feel boring to read.

I also felt like the time skips or shifts were'nt clear. Sometimes I got confused about when things were happening or how much time had passed. The same goes for the setting. At the beginning, I thought the story was set in Japan, Tokyo, but later I wasn't really sure anymore because of the unclear time jumps and transitions. And unfortunately, this leads to my next point;

The characters, especially Mika. Isn't she supposed to be Japanese? She works in Tokyo, but while reading, I never really felt like she was Japanese at all. I don't know if this is because of the writing style or her behavior, but she has absolutely no 'Japanese' characteristics at all (like how they speak or the culture etc. ykwim). I noticed this a lot because I'm quite familiar with Japan. And, well, then I realized that this book isn't a translation from a Japanese book, which is fine. But if the story is set in Japan, shouldn't it feel like Japan? Because this one really dosen't. And that bothered me a lot.

The frontal and unhinged elements I was hoping for ended up just making me feel bored and lost instead. It felt like too much yapping that never failed to make me sigh and roll my eyes. In the end, I couldn't really get into the story. I wouldn't recommend this book if you're hoping for more.

[Simon Gonzalez · Rating 2 out of 5]

A slouched novel of desperation and introspection, told through the eyes of a frantic 20-something who doesn’t know how to stop doing anything. Reading this feels like sticking your head out the window of a moving Train of Youth– and you can’t breathe. Momo Yamaguchi employs such a desperate approach to this novel that it almost feels unintelligible and too off-hinged to remain put. I wish to see someone above the age of 40 try to decipher this book out.

As an ARC, the story flows with a relaxed yet cynical and absurd narrative sense, but relying heavily on two things: puzzle-like language and chaotic moves. Yamaguchi is successful at drenching the reader in Mika’s psyche, and her psyche being dizzying from the start could be a sign that Yamaguchi purposefully shakes you – like a bug trapped in a jar – as the narrative progresses. She jumps around, blips about, uses lists and quirks and experimental storytelling that simply reads sensational, but the line of the story is not really there.

Gen Z slang flourishes in this book in a way I haven’t seen before. Where this kind of book would have been deemed too chronically plugged to the nether a couple years back, now we see laid-back modern language becoming more pervasive in a comfortable manner; much to Yamaguchi’s credit for using it right and, at times, funnily, though it is heavily distracting, overutilized, and incorrectly edited, needing some sort of revision to perhaps dial down or at least make real use (satirical, or otherwise) of this new and shiny device.

There’s a sense of “this is a lit-fic novel but it is a COOL lit-fic novel,” and it doesn’t really work that well. It doesn’t stick its landing, delivering quite dismissively. On top of that, Yamaguchi is having so much fun that she chooses all the words and all the quirks for all the pages and all the chapters. Modern slang and Old English and Millennial humor and peculiar turns of phrases– way too many things for its own good, making every component fall to the ground instead of sticking. Each page could be passed over with a fine-toothed comb and keep the essential, maintain that focus that I so kept wishing for as I read.

The story itself is also forgettable. I am already forgetting it now– a very bad sign. Mika is not a character, rather a false speaker amplifying Yamaguchi’s voice. (Isn’t that usually the case with introspective books? Yes, but the trick is not being able to tell. That’s where the magic relies.) I could see the strangeness of the book carrying its weight, sweeping under the rug any inconsistencies and just moving along.

There’s a moment near the end where Mika is explaining to the reader that, unlike women, men are rarely ever both beautiful and charming. She says you cannot be so greedy as to seek both, without backing, to produce a dry chuckle, and it brought me right back to “American Psycho,” where the men are satirically basically saying the same thing as Mika, but the other way around, instead claiming that “there are no girls with good personalities.” Yet, the satire in “Hello, Limerence” is not present, not even close, so it comes off as an honest statement meant to provoke a laugh or at least a reaction, but it lands as flat as Miko’s "plateau of nothingness,” as she calls her own chest. Is the battle of the sexes back?

Anywho, all in all, this book has some golden nuggets that need plenty of room to breathe, if only an editor with a broom and a leaf blower could pass by and help it out.

[Chloe · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thanks to Netgally and Faber and Faber for the advanced copy for an honest review.

One thing about me, I enjoy an unhinged female character, but Mika was not the one for me.

My biggest issue with this is that the blurb did not end up matching what this story is about, sadly. I had expected Mika to be an obsessed, deluded woman who stopped at nothing to find love and act out her fantasies. Ultimately though, this fell flat and went nowhere, a big shame as the first half had a decent path and plot to it that I was interested in.

The plot itself isn’t one I can recap well, beyond a woman named Mika who lives in Japan, is extremely male-centred and spends too much time speaking like a Gen Z influencer, who feels rage and imagines moments of acting out that rage, and who one day meets Tai and falls in lust with him after he half takes her virginity.

This felt very scattered as a story, with a very unlikeable main character but not in a good way, and which left me shrugging for the last 50 pages and not caring, and at times I had no real idea what was even happening, whether a chapter was her imagination, set in the future, or her inner monologue ranting.

A shame as I had high hopes for this!

[Alecia (aleciareadsitall) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hello, Limerence is a debut that packs a punch, written from the perspective of main character, Mika, a 20 something corporate woman burnt out on work, friends, and love.

Guys, I freaking loved this book. Mika was a train wreck, but at no point when I was reading did I feel like she was trying to be something she wasn’t. The writing is sharp and biting, and it calls out so much of what can be frustrating about being a young woman, especially in the dating and corporate world.

Mika’s relationship struggles were at the center of the story, but there was a lot of other witty commentary on various topics dealing with the state of the world. The last bit of the book deals with a pandemic, and I think that’s a spot where Yamaguchi’s insight and perspective really shines.

I couldn’t stop highlighting, so here are some of my fav quotes!!

“I wonder, not for the first time, how it must feel to wield the power of desire.”

“I am a product ferried across time and space, a capitalistic good of relative value.”

“If Nana is a buffalo wing drenched in blue-cheese sauce, I am a slab of raw, unseasoned chicken breast thawing on the kitchen counter: a health code violation.”

This is a book that won’t be for everyone, but I loved Mika and her antics. It was laugh-out-loud funny, and I cannot wait to read more of her stuff!!

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hello Limerance is a debut novel by Momo Yamaguchi and I was lucky enough to have an advance copy of the book.

Let me start by saying that I had to look up the meaning of “Limerance” at the outset and it’s defined as “an involuntary state of intense romantic obsession and fixation on another person”. That totally sums up the story.

Mika is a 24 year old girl who is looking for love. When someone new catches her eye, her imagination begins to run wild… That’s all I can say without giving away spoilers.

Please read any Trigger Warnings for this book before reading it. Being Gen X, I couldn’t really relate to Mika, but that having been said, I thought this was the funniest book I’ve ever read. I loved the writing style and the author is hilarious - please write more books!

[Kasee (litficlady) · Rating 4 out of 5]

This character driven book was quirky and oddly charming. I really enjoyed being in Mika’s head, she’s a freak and I love her 😂. Her streams of consciousness were also hilarious, yet poignant. The pacing kinda lulled in the middle but the ending really got me.

Thank you, Mariner for the gifted copy! All opinions are entirely my own.

[Vanessa · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF at 46% of the audio book

[Lizzy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good passive listen on audio, don't know why it took me so long to finish 😭

[Chanel Chapters · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book will make you clutch your pussy pearls

[Clara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mon affection pour ce livre a grandi au fur et à mesure !!! Au début je trouvais le rapport au cul et aux mecs chelou (c’est le but aussi), puis après j’ai appris à découvrir Mika et j’ai vrmt rigolé. Pas trop compris la partie presque dystopique sur la pandémie (le Covid aurait fait l’affaire nn ???). J’ai aimé les thèmes traités et surtout le rapport au taff. La partie chômeuse m’a tuee.

[Quinty · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.75⭐️ If you love a book with a somewhat unlikable, delusional main character, please do yourself a favor and pick this up.

Ever spiraled over a crush, already fantasized your entire life together before you ever even said ‘hi’ to each other? Yea… so does our main character Mika. She’s 24 years old and tired of her boring life and more importantly, tired of being a virgin. But not for much longer. She’s determined to change this.

Her inner monologue is downright crazy and ridiculous at times, but I can’t help but love her for it. She’s not afraid to speak her mind and boy does she have a lot to say. A Gen Z girl at heart.
She’s just so incredibly funny and relatable while simultaneously being completely delusional. I caught myself giggling, just having so much fun while reading this.

It feels similar in a way to My Year of Rest and Relaxation in the sense that it’s relatable, kind of depressing, humorous and not afraid to mock itself at times. In other words, my kind of book.

Thank you, NetGalley and the publisher, for the arc. Truly couldn’t have wished for a better arc to start the year with.

[Lucy Munnings]

Yeah no this didn’t work for me. Started off on the wrong foot with how the protagonist was consistently experiencing SA in the work place but then proceeds to sa her friends and be pervy towards other men. Found that the mc was far more than ‘unhinged’
I got 70% in before deciding I had no interest continuing. Feel the author was trying to do something but missed

[Anaya Dey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honestly, I don't know where to begin with this book. I had only chosen it because it was the only book that seemed slightly interesting to me on BOTM (Book Of The Month), but boy was it even better. I literally spent half my day at the lake reading this book before I had to put it down to interact with other people (plus sand was getting everywhere).

The story follows Mika going through her mid twenties trying to find love in what I'm assuming 2010s Tokyo, Japan. She's not attractive, but not terribly ugly, and is just going through her life day by day. Sleep, eat, work, and then maybe hangout with the one friend you have but its more like their your best friend but you aren't their best friend. Mika is has very opiniated thoughts about the world she lives in, with topics or race, misogyny, and homophobia pop up throughout the book. She is constantly pressured by her mother to get into a relationship or at least have a roster. Mika finally meets a guy after she attends a party with her "best" friend, and after talking for a little bit over the course of a couple of weeks, they finally meet up to have sex. Only for him to put it in halfway befor epulling out. Nothing is initiated every again, though they still remain in a weird situationship stage. She ends up meeting another guy and goes all the way, and tries to juggle talking to two men, one having attachment avoidant issues, and the other with commitment issues.

We go with Mika as she struggles with friendships and creating new ones, toxic workplaces that involve sexual harassment or pushing her to have more work then she should be doing, familia relationships, and her love life.

It honestly feels like an autobiography in the sense where it doesn't feel like fiction. Through the various chapters, I felt like there was, multitude of things that I could relate to, or have heard my friends talk about. Every chapter was an interesting read, as some of them were formatted in a different way. Some chapter were also pretty short and reminded me of how Canon by Paige Lewis is written (still need to finish that book), which was really enjoyable because it gets straight to the point while still keeping the text interesting.

Hello, Limerence does end on a happy note that I won't spoil, but I would highly recommend it be read. I definitely want to check out more of Momo Yamaguchi's books if she has any, as this book was written so well with a good mix or seriousness as well as whimsy and funniness.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars

This was a TRIP!

Do I love Mika? Do I hate Mika? Do I sometimes think I’ve definitely been Mika at one point or another in my life? The answer to all 3 is most definitely YES.

Witty and on-the-nose humor, Momo Yamaguchi throws us into the life of Mika and how she’s navigating being a 24 year-old Japanese woman dealing with work/love/friends/family/etc.

Hysterically funny at times, cringe-worthy at others, she says and does the things that I know a lot of women do as well, but can’t articulate it the same way.

The narrator, Noe Nishizawa, did a fantastic job bringing Mika and the other characters to life, and I feel like the audio only enhanced the reading experience.

If you like unhinged female characters and on-the-nose humor, give this a listen and you won’t be disappointed.

Thanks to Harper Audio & NetGalley for this advanced listener copy. All thoughts and opinions are my own and my review is left voluntarily.

[Lianda · Rating 4 out of 5]

So weird. Weird girl literature is my thing. Is it the best prose ever? No. Is it coherent? Absolutely not. But… I enjoyed the sprinkling of anti-men propaganda, very relatable, albeit artificially inseminated like unrelated commentary. Another complaint, the main character is annoyingly insecure and naive. Yet, that’s coming from a woman who’s her opposite.
But, I LOVED the unhinged fantasies, the smart word play and the cultural aspects about Tokyo and Japan. For 200 words it packs a punch and a laugh!

[James O'Bannon]

i’m so sorry, i just can’t

[Ebony]

Wtf is this

[apryl]

lol

[Matt · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thank you to Fabre & Fabre for this free proof copy!

Unfortunately this was a miss for me, though some things really worked well in it

The true highlight of this book are all the little ways this book is just so relatable in a ‘guilty pleasure’ way. So many sentences jumped out at me, reflecting my own habits in Mika. The writing was funny and I also really enjoyed the little fantasies Mika has of hurting people who have wronged her, but unfortunately they become quite sparse as the book progresses

The book also touches on some serious topics despite the overall humorous and light hearted tone. Toxic work culture, workplace harassment, globalisation. It made it stand out as more than just a funny book, but I wish there was more of this commentary in it

As for what didn’t work - kind of everything else. It felt a bit too immature and I didn’t really care for Mika’s love life problems and obsessions. Her love interests were annoying and everyone in this book treated her so badly? But in the way that I was left angry Mika didn’t respect herself more and end these relationships and friendships sooner. I admit that I started skimming a bit by the end because I just wanted to be finished with it, though the ending was interesting

[rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5!

[Rach Stanton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Slightly trashy Japanese holiday read, following a woman in a journey to discover her sexuality.