What do you think?
Rate this book
We Do What We Do in the Dark
" Hart’s novel does something exceptional that few pieces of fiction have done successfully….[H]as flashes of Sally Rooney’s Conversations With Friends ." – New York Times
“An unforgettable account of a forbidden romance.” – Nicole Dennis-Benn, author of Patsy
“Moving and memorable.” – Meg Wolitzer, author of The Female Persuasion
“Sensual and wise.” – Tayari Jones, author of An American Marriage
A novel about a young woman’s life-altering affair with a much older, married woman.
Mallory is a freshman in college when she meets the woman. She sees her for the first time at the university’s gym, immediately entranced by this elegant, older person, whom she later learns is married and works at the school. Before long, they begin a clandestine affair. Self-possessed, successful, brilliant, and aloof, the woman absolutely consumes Mallory, who is still reeling from her mother’s death a few months earlier. Mallory retreats from the rest of the world and into a relationship with this melancholy, elusive woman she admires so much yet who can never be fully hers, solidifying a sense of solitude that has both haunted and soothed her as long as she can remember.
Years after the affair has ended, Mallory must decide whether to stay safely in this isolation, this constructed loneliness, or to step fully into the world and confront what the woman meant to her, for better or worse. This simmering, unsettling debut novel reveals the consequences of desire and influence, portraying two women whose lives have been transformed by love, loss, and secrecy.
“An unforgettable account of a forbidden romance.” – Nicole Dennis-Benn, author of Patsy
“Moving and memorable.” – Meg Wolitzer, author of The Female Persuasion
“Sensual and wise.” – Tayari Jones, author of An American Marriage
A novel about a young woman’s life-altering affair with a much older, married woman.
Mallory is a freshman in college when she meets the woman. She sees her for the first time at the university’s gym, immediately entranced by this elegant, older person, whom she later learns is married and works at the school. Before long, they begin a clandestine affair. Self-possessed, successful, brilliant, and aloof, the woman absolutely consumes Mallory, who is still reeling from her mother’s death a few months earlier. Mallory retreats from the rest of the world and into a relationship with this melancholy, elusive woman she admires so much yet who can never be fully hers, solidifying a sense of solitude that has both haunted and soothed her as long as she can remember.
Years after the affair has ended, Mallory must decide whether to stay safely in this isolation, this constructed loneliness, or to step fully into the world and confront what the woman meant to her, for better or worse. This simmering, unsettling debut novel reveals the consequences of desire and influence, portraying two women whose lives have been transformed by love, loss, and secrecy.
224 pages, Paperback
First published May 3, 2022
471 people are currently reading
53622 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 2,318 reviews
May 12, 2022
this is for lonely (gay) girls everywhere!!!!
![Profile Image for s.penkevich [hiatus-will return-miss you all].](/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.gr-assets.com%2Fimages%2FS%2Fcompressed.photo.goodreads.com%2Fusers%2F1735525095i%2F6431467._UX200_CR0%2C11%2C200%2C200_.jpg&w=128&q=75)
July 7, 2024
‘We do what we do in the dark and then we deal with it all alone.’
How do we fill the cracks in our lives to abate the loneliness that can overtake us? What do we keep in the shadows to cling to when there seems to be nothing else? ‘No one should use another person to get over their own loneliness,’ college student Mallory is warned in Michelle Hart’s searingly beautiful and bittersweet debut We Do What We Do in the Dark, yet the desire to be consumed by another draws Mallory and a woman twice her age together into a moving portrait of queer relations, power imbalances and a search for the self in the maelstrom of emotions. It is a push and pull of loneliness and shame, though Hart examines how the burden of shame—‘ an untouchable intensity, or an intense untouchability, to keeping a secret, to having a continuous crush, that Mallory wanted never to lose’— can also become a sort of consuming desire. A crisp novel with direct prose that feels simplistic on the outset but weaves a gorgeous poetic sensibility packed with powerful symbolism, We Do What We Do in the Dark delicately and dynamically unpacks struggles with grief, loneliness and shame in a heartbreaking story about how the things we hold in the shadows can cast their own shadows over the course of our lives. It is a novel that will burn you and you’ll be better for it.
‘No one is lovable at your age.’
The novel zeroes in on people at their most vulnerable, wracked with either grief, loneliness, a bit of youthful naivete or a cocktail of all three. 18 years old, just started college and still reeling from the death of her mother, Mallory is ‘s a sad girl, a lonely girl, and, after a lifetime of practice, she had become so good at this that it had become the most appealing thing about her.’ In many ways this book read like the lesbian cousin to Conversations With Friends from Sally Rooney in the way that Mallory lacks a sense of self and seeks to find herself as she is reflected back by others. Particularly a much older, married lover in an authoritative position over her (she is a professor of children’s literature, but not Mallory’s professor). We see both in the present and in a flashback, how Mallory tends to fill the void of a mother with mother figures like the always unnamed woman or her childhood friend’s mother and tries to mold herself through her assumptions of their gaze upon her. She absorbs the woman’s personality in many ways, such as reading all the books she teaches and even her husband’s finance books.
‘i'm afraid of being alone and afraid that is the only way i know how to be.’
There is a great line about Mallory absorbing both the woman and her books early in the novel. ‘Mallory’s affair with the woman had reminded her of why she loved reading books,’ Hart writes, ‘to have her own life and innermost feelings reflected back to her.’I love this quote because it really gets into why people love reading but also how Mallory contextualizes herself by what is reflected back by the woman. Which is getting into Jean-Paul Sartre’s idea of “bad faith” when we allow the gaze of others to define us (or, perhaps, even that in her grief and desire for a mother figure, Mallory has regressed into a sort of “mirror stage” as discussed by Jacques Lacan) and we see how through the next 10 years of Mallory’s life this relationship has shaped and continues to shape her life even in subtle ways. Mallory’s existentialism class points towards a lot of these themes as well, though she often doesn’t recognize it at the time. Though more importantly, Mallory’s desire to be seen and understood also align with her sexual desires and her affair with the woman places her now in an incredibly vulnerable position as her whole sense of self hinges on her obsession for the woman and wanting to please her. This is later hinted at as well in flashbacks with her neighbor’s mother, where even if their shared loneliness doesn’t develop into a sexual relationship their scenes together are teeming with sexual tension.
Hart’s reading metaphor permeates the novel in other ways too. The book is written in a fairly direct prose and for how much emotion is boiling beneath the surface the prose doesn’t feel particularly passionate. Which is a rather brilliant framing that hits a few key ideas. Sure, the affair is less passion and more obsession but the prose style seems to reflect the ways Mallory—and the novel itself—internalizes a lot of the woman’s lessons on children’s books:
The direct, unadorned prose is a representation of a sentence that does one single thing and all the feelings are distilled into rather impersonal, almost basic terms. The novel does contain a large flashback sequence, but it isn’t until after the affair when Mallory perhaps now feels free to have her own exposition and flashbacks instead of self-confining to the woman’s idea of story. I find it interesting that the novel is third person narration though we only ever know what is inside of Mallory’s head. Its as if she cannot center herself to be the “I” in a story where she can only read herself in the context of the woman. It is also interesting that the woman does not get a name. In an interview in Shondaland, Hart discusses this choice:
There is also a sense that by not naming her, she shows Mallory does not have power over her, something very obvious as the power imbalance of the relationship tips heavily towards the woman. Though Mallory also does not name her as an act of privacy, as Mallory later realizes the damage she could have done to the woman’s private and professional lives had she revealed their affair.
‘That’s how I know you won’t tell anyone about us. If you did, whatever this is would no longer be just yours,’ the woman tells Mallory. This hits the heart of the novel, the idea of how ‘ the feeling of wanting in and of itself became desirable’ and even if Mallory (and the woman) and are often wracked with a sense of guilt and shame for the affair, it is something to hold on to. Something ‘we do in the dark and then we deal with it all alone,’ because to share it would remove the one private thing they have. It makes shame a rather complex emotion.
This wisdom from the woman becomes something Mallory grapples with through the whole novel but we also see it as a larger cultural conundrum. Mallory’s story is briefly juxtaposed with the woman’s discussion on Germany’s relationship to their own historical past in WWII and then later Mallory is at first appalled by Salem, Massachusetts being so open and blithe with their own history of the witch trials. It becomes symbolic in learning to unburden oneself of the secrets you hold onto, and towards the end a girlfriend of Mallory’s discusses how letting out a secret is a way to feel free.
Something I think this novel did particularly well was address issues of shame and allow for a portrayal of a messy, queer relationship without dwelling on the idea of sexuality as shameful. The forbidden love here is the power imbalance and that the woman is married, not that they are both women. Hart speaks on this in an interview with BOMB magazine:
I appreciate the framing here that queerness is not a deviation of the norm and that the novel can have these in-depth examinations of identity without having to wade through moments of homophobia, both external and internalized. Not that these aren’t important or interesting discussions, but we have authors like James Baldwin or Jeanette Winterson among others who have dealt with this exceptionally well and Hart has her own story to tell. Especially as she mentions the book is inspired by her own life in ways.
The symbolism in this novel is fantastic though. Moments such as watching a rabbit free itself from a hole in a fence with Mallory both glad it got free but also missing the rabbit make for incredible commentary on the novel. Or another favorite moment was the discussion on the house from The House of the Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne being ‘two disparate things rolled into one: the residence of actual, historical families, and a re-creation of the setting from the fiction book,’ because ‘after the novel’s publication, the house became more famous for having been written about than having been lived in.’ It serves as a great metaphor for the way Mallory herself has become both her own history but also a self that was rewritten by her relationship with the woman. And, to a greater extent, it shows how much of this book is about the ways we look back and recontextualize our relationships. Though most beautiful is the symbolism of light and dark, the dark places we hold our secrets and then the light in which we release them and feel free.
‘It was a lot of light. everywhere she looked, even if she closed her eyes, there it was. she felt there was nothing between her and the overwhelming brightness of the world.’
This was a rather devastating yet gorgeous novel that moves through the grittiness of obsession and shame in a way that shook me deeply. It feels authentic, it feels like the shames we all keep inside somewhere. But it also unburdens us, makes us recognize we are not alone in these feelings and that we can come to an understanding of ourselves for ourselves. Not that these moments in our pasts don’t matter, and will likely cast a shadow across our lives, but we need not hide in those shadows and can come out into the light accepting the past and looking towards the future. While the structure of the novel becomes a bit messy in the second half and the flashback sequences fell a bit flat compared to the present, this was a wonderfully written novel that used the prose to lean into its own themes. What We Do in the Dark is a moving portrait of queer desire, messy relationships, obsession and a yearning to push aside our loneliness and it was a haunting little read.
⅘
‘Loneliness always seems so luxurious…all the time I want to be by myself but then when I am, I desperately want someone else around.’
How do we fill the cracks in our lives to abate the loneliness that can overtake us? What do we keep in the shadows to cling to when there seems to be nothing else? ‘No one should use another person to get over their own loneliness,’ college student Mallory is warned in Michelle Hart’s searingly beautiful and bittersweet debut We Do What We Do in the Dark, yet the desire to be consumed by another draws Mallory and a woman twice her age together into a moving portrait of queer relations, power imbalances and a search for the self in the maelstrom of emotions. It is a push and pull of loneliness and shame, though Hart examines how the burden of shame—‘ an untouchable intensity, or an intense untouchability, to keeping a secret, to having a continuous crush, that Mallory wanted never to lose’— can also become a sort of consuming desire. A crisp novel with direct prose that feels simplistic on the outset but weaves a gorgeous poetic sensibility packed with powerful symbolism, We Do What We Do in the Dark delicately and dynamically unpacks struggles with grief, loneliness and shame in a heartbreaking story about how the things we hold in the shadows can cast their own shadows over the course of our lives. It is a novel that will burn you and you’ll be better for it.
‘No one is lovable at your age.’
The novel zeroes in on people at their most vulnerable, wracked with either grief, loneliness, a bit of youthful naivete or a cocktail of all three. 18 years old, just started college and still reeling from the death of her mother, Mallory is ‘s a sad girl, a lonely girl, and, after a lifetime of practice, she had become so good at this that it had become the most appealing thing about her.’ In many ways this book read like the lesbian cousin to Conversations With Friends from Sally Rooney in the way that Mallory lacks a sense of self and seeks to find herself as she is reflected back by others. Particularly a much older, married lover in an authoritative position over her (she is a professor of children’s literature, but not Mallory’s professor). We see both in the present and in a flashback, how Mallory tends to fill the void of a mother with mother figures like the always unnamed woman or her childhood friend’s mother and tries to mold herself through her assumptions of their gaze upon her. She absorbs the woman’s personality in many ways, such as reading all the books she teaches and even her husband’s finance books.
‘i'm afraid of being alone and afraid that is the only way i know how to be.’
There is a great line about Mallory absorbing both the woman and her books early in the novel. ‘Mallory’s affair with the woman had reminded her of why she loved reading books,’ Hart writes, ‘to have her own life and innermost feelings reflected back to her.’I love this quote because it really gets into why people love reading but also how Mallory contextualizes herself by what is reflected back by the woman. Which is getting into Jean-Paul Sartre’s idea of “bad faith” when we allow the gaze of others to define us (or, perhaps, even that in her grief and desire for a mother figure, Mallory has regressed into a sort of “mirror stage” as discussed by Jacques Lacan) and we see how through the next 10 years of Mallory’s life this relationship has shaped and continues to shape her life even in subtle ways. Mallory’s existentialism class points towards a lot of these themes as well, though she often doesn’t recognize it at the time. Though more importantly, Mallory’s desire to be seen and understood also align with her sexual desires and her affair with the woman places her now in an incredibly vulnerable position as her whole sense of self hinges on her obsession for the woman and wanting to please her. This is later hinted at as well in flashbacks with her neighbor’s mother, where even if their shared loneliness doesn’t develop into a sexual relationship their scenes together are teeming with sexual tension.
Hart’s reading metaphor permeates the novel in other ways too. The book is written in a fairly direct prose and for how much emotion is boiling beneath the surface the prose doesn’t feel particularly passionate. Which is a rather brilliant framing that hits a few key ideas. Sure, the affair is less passion and more obsession but the prose style seems to reflect the ways Mallory—and the novel itself—internalizes a lot of the woman’s lessons on children’s books:
‘Picture books are lessons in how to tell stories without exposition or flashbacks; how a sentence written for children only does a single thing, and how the verb “to feel,” which gets short shrift in literature, is the most effective way to convey raw emotion.’
The direct, unadorned prose is a representation of a sentence that does one single thing and all the feelings are distilled into rather impersonal, almost basic terms. The novel does contain a large flashback sequence, but it isn’t until after the affair when Mallory perhaps now feels free to have her own exposition and flashbacks instead of self-confining to the woman’s idea of story. I find it interesting that the novel is third person narration though we only ever know what is inside of Mallory’s head. Its as if she cannot center herself to be the “I” in a story where she can only read herself in the context of the woman. It is also interesting that the woman does not get a name. In an interview in Shondaland, Hart discusses this choice:
‘ for Mallory, she would always be “the woman.” She’s almost the ideal that Mallory is aspiring to, the platonic ideal of womanhood. At least how Mallory sort of conceives it.’
There is also a sense that by not naming her, she shows Mallory does not have power over her, something very obvious as the power imbalance of the relationship tips heavily towards the woman. Though Mallory also does not name her as an act of privacy, as Mallory later realizes the damage she could have done to the woman’s private and professional lives had she revealed their affair.
‘That’s how I know you won’t tell anyone about us. If you did, whatever this is would no longer be just yours,’ the woman tells Mallory. This hits the heart of the novel, the idea of how ‘ the feeling of wanting in and of itself became desirable’ and even if Mallory (and the woman) and are often wracked with a sense of guilt and shame for the affair, it is something to hold on to. Something ‘we do in the dark and then we deal with it all alone,’ because to share it would remove the one private thing they have. It makes shame a rather complex emotion.
‘Shame and pride often feel like the same thing. You begin to want to protect even the most embarrassing parts of your life.’
This wisdom from the woman becomes something Mallory grapples with through the whole novel but we also see it as a larger cultural conundrum. Mallory’s story is briefly juxtaposed with the woman’s discussion on Germany’s relationship to their own historical past in WWII and then later Mallory is at first appalled by Salem, Massachusetts being so open and blithe with their own history of the witch trials. It becomes symbolic in learning to unburden oneself of the secrets you hold onto, and towards the end a girlfriend of Mallory’s discusses how letting out a secret is a way to feel free.
Something I think this novel did particularly well was address issues of shame and allow for a portrayal of a messy, queer relationship without dwelling on the idea of sexuality as shameful. The forbidden love here is the power imbalance and that the woman is married, not that they are both women. Hart speaks on this in an interview with BOMB magazine:
‘Mallory wrestling with who she is was not as interesting to me as Mallory wrestling with what that means. As a Literary Gay, and as a Lesbian Who Has Seen Every Lesbian Movie, it often feels that our stories begin and end when we come out. I think the popularity of coming out stories, especially among heterosexual audiences, is a backhanded way of othering us. If we have to “come out” as gay, that means we have to announce our diversion from the norm.
I also wanted to explore the other facets of Mallory’s identity: her penchant for solitude, her thoughts about art, her aspirations, her relationship with her mom. These things, of course, are not separate from her queerness. Sexuality is a significant part of a person’s life, but it is just a part.’
I appreciate the framing here that queerness is not a deviation of the norm and that the novel can have these in-depth examinations of identity without having to wade through moments of homophobia, both external and internalized. Not that these aren’t important or interesting discussions, but we have authors like James Baldwin or Jeanette Winterson among others who have dealt with this exceptionally well and Hart has her own story to tell. Especially as she mentions the book is inspired by her own life in ways.
The symbolism in this novel is fantastic though. Moments such as watching a rabbit free itself from a hole in a fence with Mallory both glad it got free but also missing the rabbit make for incredible commentary on the novel. Or another favorite moment was the discussion on the house from The House of the Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne being ‘two disparate things rolled into one: the residence of actual, historical families, and a re-creation of the setting from the fiction book,’ because ‘after the novel’s publication, the house became more famous for having been written about than having been lived in.’ It serves as a great metaphor for the way Mallory herself has become both her own history but also a self that was rewritten by her relationship with the woman. And, to a greater extent, it shows how much of this book is about the ways we look back and recontextualize our relationships. Though most beautiful is the symbolism of light and dark, the dark places we hold our secrets and then the light in which we release them and feel free.
‘It was a lot of light. everywhere she looked, even if she closed her eyes, there it was. she felt there was nothing between her and the overwhelming brightness of the world.’
This was a rather devastating yet gorgeous novel that moves through the grittiness of obsession and shame in a way that shook me deeply. It feels authentic, it feels like the shames we all keep inside somewhere. But it also unburdens us, makes us recognize we are not alone in these feelings and that we can come to an understanding of ourselves for ourselves. Not that these moments in our pasts don’t matter, and will likely cast a shadow across our lives, but we need not hide in those shadows and can come out into the light accepting the past and looking towards the future. While the structure of the novel becomes a bit messy in the second half and the flashback sequences fell a bit flat compared to the present, this was a wonderfully written novel that used the prose to lean into its own themes. What We Do in the Dark is a moving portrait of queer desire, messy relationships, obsession and a yearning to push aside our loneliness and it was a haunting little read.
⅘
‘Loneliness always seems so luxurious…all the time I want to be by myself but then when I am, I desperately want someone else around.’
January 16, 2022
This is a slim and spare but deeply poignant novel of a defining queer love affair. What's most notable here isn't the age difference between our protagonist Mallory (who is 19 or so) and her lover (likely 40's or 50's) or the fact that one is a student and one is a professor. Instead it's the book's insistence on remaining in Mallory's perspective, the narrowness of her view.
This life-altering relationship is often different for queer people than it is for everyone else, often there is an age difference or other significant unbalanced power dynamics, an elder and a youth. It doesn't mean it doesn't get messy, but it is a different animal. We are so zoomed in on Mallory's view that this becomes clear, the fact that her lover is married (to a man) means very little to Mallory, neither does her age or status, even though all those things are clearly part of what creates Mallory's obsession. She is too young to want to figure out her feelings or make sense of them, she simply wants what she wants. She certainly isn't going to spend a lot of time thinking about how she embarks on this relationship shortly after the death of her mother.
Eventually we get to see some of Mallory's life both before and after this affair, and I thought we got just enough of both. Even though we get the short version of what has happened before, getting to see it directly puts the affair in a very different light. And we also get to see her grapple with how to move past the obsession even after the affair is over.
I can tell that I am getting old because so many of my feelings towards Mallory were of the "Oh, Sweetie" type. She is so young through much of the book, and single-minded in the way that seems only possible during that time in your life. We never get to a full version of Mallory's narrative, how she eventually fits the story of the affair into her life, but we do get to see her start moving in that direction and I found that to be just enough.
The prose here is often quite straightforward, both very close to Mallory and also a bit at a remove. It is a delicate balance but I ended up liking it very much.
This life-altering relationship is often different for queer people than it is for everyone else, often there is an age difference or other significant unbalanced power dynamics, an elder and a youth. It doesn't mean it doesn't get messy, but it is a different animal. We are so zoomed in on Mallory's view that this becomes clear, the fact that her lover is married (to a man) means very little to Mallory, neither does her age or status, even though all those things are clearly part of what creates Mallory's obsession. She is too young to want to figure out her feelings or make sense of them, she simply wants what she wants. She certainly isn't going to spend a lot of time thinking about how she embarks on this relationship shortly after the death of her mother.
Eventually we get to see some of Mallory's life both before and after this affair, and I thought we got just enough of both. Even though we get the short version of what has happened before, getting to see it directly puts the affair in a very different light. And we also get to see her grapple with how to move past the obsession even after the affair is over.
I can tell that I am getting old because so many of my feelings towards Mallory were of the "Oh, Sweetie" type. She is so young through much of the book, and single-minded in the way that seems only possible during that time in your life. We never get to a full version of Mallory's narrative, how she eventually fits the story of the affair into her life, but we do get to see her start moving in that direction and I found that to be just enough.
The prose here is often quite straightforward, both very close to Mallory and also a bit at a remove. It is a delicate balance but I ended up liking it very much.
June 20, 2022
4.5 fantastic and cerebral and brilliant in the way only literary fiction about lesbians can be
Read
July 25, 2022this book felt lonely in a distinctly recognizable (read: lesbian) way. it's a beautiful thing to be so far removed from men, but it's a uniquely isolating experience. i found so many of my past disoriented feelings reflected in mallory's attempt to navigate a deeply heteronormative world which she ultimately could never really find a link to. i felt her desperation as she endlessly sought to escape from that world and its structures, and it was equally beautiful and jarring.
June 14, 2022
I was intrigued by the premise and the gorgeous cover. The writing however is so emotionally flat that I was slightly in awe that someone could render something like an affair, which is by its very nature driven by desire, so devoid of feeling and want. There's a lot of telling language and not much showing; despite being claustrophobically close narratively to Mallory, we don't truly get attached to her as more than a literary device. A lot about the book felt "device-y" in that studied, MFA way that often falls into a reciting of facts without feelings. I don't mind a literary read -- in fact, as a language lover, I purposely seek them out -- and I will read books in which nothing much happens so long as the language is lovely and the emotion is there. This book didn't tick those boxes for me.
Intriguing premise (we need more stories of sapphics behaving in complicated ways!) that fell flat for me in the execution.
Intriguing premise (we need more stories of sapphics behaving in complicated ways!) that fell flat for me in the execution.
March 3, 2023
"i'm afraid of being alone and afraid that is the only way i know how to be." 3.5
May 20, 2022
I liked how the book started but once it drifted towards Mallory's childhood I gradually lost interest. Overall, what I didn't like was how matter-of-factly it was all written. Despite the relationship being an unconventional one in matters of age difference, marriage status and professional disposition, all of which would have normally caused some tension and struggle between people, the two women often acted in a very straightforward and unemotional manner.
August 2, 2022
we do what we do in the dark is a coming of age story from the perspective of mallory, a lesbian who partakes in an affair with an older college professor, that focuses on the loneliness and aloneness of life as our heroine unpacks the shame that plagues her being. touches on desire, both understanding and accepting your sexuality, and grief.
after reading this in mere hours i can safely say i am in pain. lesbians with mommy issues, lesbians with a desire for older women, lesbians who have ever been consumed with want, and lesbians in general regardless of how you fit into the label, this is for us. this novel understands our unique experience, never once attaching disgust or shame to it or to us. in a sense this novel celebrates us, and the journeys we take to becoming ourselves under the lesbian label and in life.
the way michelle hart writes floors me; the beauty attached to her words is mesmerising. the beauty here comes under the sharpness and pain attached to the prose, meaning that it almost felt wrong to bear witness to another individual’s explicit want and need for another the way mallory desires the woman who remains nameless throughout the book. it is an understandable want, however, to be completely taken with your first lesbian love, as everything falls into place within you for the first time in your life. here both the age gap and power dynamic between mallory and the woman allow for mallory’s narrow mindset to take centre stage as she loses herself in lust and her blind ignorance.
as mallory loses herself further, hart expertly delves into the concepts of loneliness and aloneness, choosing to highlight how the two often are confused with the other or viewed as being the same, but instead are separate entities we are all too common with. to be a lesbian means that you experience a wholly different queer experience to those who identify otherwise. to be completely devoid of any attraction or meaning to men, is a blessing, but one that comes with a severe bout of loneliness attached to it. those who identify any other way sexuality-wise will never understand the inherent need of another woman and the incessant disinterest in men. we are the only group of people who understand this and it is as i said previously, isolating. the shame not only attached to the word lesbian but also the experience can wreck you if you let it. mallory grapples with this, and the journey we follow her on is one of pain and gratification. it is a journey i happily, understanding every emotion she felt and having experienced it myself, followed her on. it is a journey that is emotional from start to end due to the rawness of it all, but one that ends exactly as you want it to. it felt fitting.
”they went to bed that night underneath the stars, gazing up through the glass roof of the house at the clear and sparkling sky. when mallory woke the next morning, caroline was making coffee. daybreak had been dimmed by a window scrim, and when mallory pulled it open, staggering, unflinching sunshine suddenly flooded the tiny house. it was a lot of light. everywhere she looked, even if she closed her eyes, there it was. she felt there was nothing between her and the overwhelming brightness of the world.”
after reading this in mere hours i can safely say i am in pain. lesbians with mommy issues, lesbians with a desire for older women, lesbians who have ever been consumed with want, and lesbians in general regardless of how you fit into the label, this is for us. this novel understands our unique experience, never once attaching disgust or shame to it or to us. in a sense this novel celebrates us, and the journeys we take to becoming ourselves under the lesbian label and in life.
the way michelle hart writes floors me; the beauty attached to her words is mesmerising. the beauty here comes under the sharpness and pain attached to the prose, meaning that it almost felt wrong to bear witness to another individual’s explicit want and need for another the way mallory desires the woman who remains nameless throughout the book. it is an understandable want, however, to be completely taken with your first lesbian love, as everything falls into place within you for the first time in your life. here both the age gap and power dynamic between mallory and the woman allow for mallory’s narrow mindset to take centre stage as she loses herself in lust and her blind ignorance.
as mallory loses herself further, hart expertly delves into the concepts of loneliness and aloneness, choosing to highlight how the two often are confused with the other or viewed as being the same, but instead are separate entities we are all too common with. to be a lesbian means that you experience a wholly different queer experience to those who identify otherwise. to be completely devoid of any attraction or meaning to men, is a blessing, but one that comes with a severe bout of loneliness attached to it. those who identify any other way sexuality-wise will never understand the inherent need of another woman and the incessant disinterest in men. we are the only group of people who understand this and it is as i said previously, isolating. the shame not only attached to the word lesbian but also the experience can wreck you if you let it. mallory grapples with this, and the journey we follow her on is one of pain and gratification. it is a journey i happily, understanding every emotion she felt and having experienced it myself, followed her on. it is a journey that is emotional from start to end due to the rawness of it all, but one that ends exactly as you want it to. it felt fitting.
”they went to bed that night underneath the stars, gazing up through the glass roof of the house at the clear and sparkling sky. when mallory woke the next morning, caroline was making coffee. daybreak had been dimmed by a window scrim, and when mallory pulled it open, staggering, unflinching sunshine suddenly flooded the tiny house. it was a lot of light. everywhere she looked, even if she closed her eyes, there it was. she felt there was nothing between her and the overwhelming brightness of the world.”
Read
June 5, 2022Source of book: NetGalley (thank you)
Relevant disclaimers: none
Please note: This review may not be reproduced or quoted, in whole or in part, without explicit consent from the author.
And remember: I am not here to judge your drag, I mean your book. Books are art and art is subjective. These are just my personal thoughts. They are not meant to be taken as broader commentary on the general quality of the work. Believe me, I have not enjoyed many an excellent book, and my individual lack of enjoyment has not made any of those books less excellent or (more relevantly) less successful.
Further disclaimer: Readers, please stop accusing me of trying to take down “my competition” because I wrote a review you didn’t like. This is complete nonsense. Firstly, writing isn’t a competitive sport. Secondly, I only publish reviews of books in the subgenre where I’m best known (queer romcom) if they’re glowing. And finally: taking time out of my life to read an entire book, then write a detailed review about it that some people on GR will look at would be a profoundly inefficient and ineffective way to damage the careers of other authors. If you can’t credit me with simply being a person who loves books and likes talking about them, at least credit me with enough common sense to be a better villain.
*******************************************
Oh God, I never know what to do with litfic. I just think it’s hard to really engage meaningfully in a book you know you’re supposed to admire and be impressed by. I mean, I’m not saying I didn’t admire this, nor that I wasn’t impressed by it … it’s just y’know. It’s litfic? Honestly, I think I might just have genre writer’s resentment because litfic tends to position not as a genre (which it is) but as kind of unquestioned default for fiction in general. Because litfic is the white cishet man of genre fiction. Which I guess makes sense, because it’s mostly written by cishet white men.
In any case, We Do What We Do in The Dark (not to be confused with How Hight We Go in the Dark or, I guess, What We Do In The Shadows, though I would 100% read a version of this book that also contained vampires) is neither written by nor about a cishet white man which is probably why I was willing to read it at all. It’s heroine, Mallory, is a lonely lesbian whose childhood is overshadowed by her mother’s slow death from cancer and whose college years are dominated by a single relationship. Well, I say relationship, it’s more of an affair—with an older, married professor the text refers to only as “the woman.” This, in itself, is interesting because I can easily see a text, written by a different author about different things, where this was an act of power, control, objectification and dehumanisation. In WDWWDITD it gives “the woman” a sort of mythic resonance. It reflects both her power over Mallory and her ultimately unknowability to Mallory.
The book spans several time periods in Mallory’s life, though it moves through them non-chronologically, starting first at college, with her affair with the woman, then moving back to her adolescence, then to the aftermath of college, when the woman reappears in her life once more, and finally into the more distant future. While this structure feels transparently … litficcy, it does encourage us to understand on Mallory’s life thematically rather than causally (instead of just “her mother died and this left her so sad and rootless she had an ill-advised affair”). The book is relentlessly focused on Mallory’s interiority, it’s perspective claustrophobically confined to hers. I’m kind of a bit startled by all the reviews being like, “easy beach read” because, I mean, this is a story about grief and loneliness, the way they intersect with and shape love and desire. It’s a story about a relationship that, while it’s definitely consensual, should also make any reasonable person uncomfortable (as, I think it is meant to). And, yes, the prose has a simplicity to it but it’s deceptive simplicity:
I mean, I don’t know. That isn’t really shouting relaxing summer afternoon to me? But that could just be just me.
I’m also growing increasingly concerned that I’ve written one of those reviews I really don’t like: like, where review writer clearly was resistant to the book on principle, but then grudgingly had to concede its merit. I do not want to be that arsehole. And at least WDWWDITD wasn’t about sad gay men dying alone in Florida.
So let me try again to be fairer: this is an intriguing, deftly written book that explores several extremely complicated subjects—the loss of a parent, a relationship with an unaddressably unequal power imbalance—with nuance and depth. On top of which, the fact that the relationship in question is sapphic offers new perspective on an old subject, confronts us with different questions, for example the fact that we tend to be more forgiving of age/experience disparities in queer relationships. Despite the fact that there’s academic connection between Mallory and the woman, it would be hard to avoid the potentially toxic and exploitative implications of their relationship if the woman was a man. But, as a queer woman, Mallory herself lacks the same cultural framework.
Speaking of Mallory’s identity, while the woman herself is very clear that she is not “like Mallory”, and pursues mainly relationships with men, in and out of matrimony, Mallory is gay goes on to have further relationships with woman and is understood to be gay by most people in her life, so even though it contributes to her sense of isolation it is not, in reality, a source of rejection or prejudice for her. I found this a subtle take on the impact of queerness of a life as lived, especially in a world where it’s not supposed to be a problem any more per se: which is to say, it’s both significant and non-significant for Mallory, and is yet another complicating factor in her relationship with the woman. On the one side we have age, experience, and straightness, all the trappings of a stable heteronormative existence. On the other, youth, inexperience, queerness, and—due to the loss of her mother—a breaking down of family dynamics and the traditional support structures we tend to take for granted.
I guess if I had to put labels on this book, I’d call its sensibility post-queer and post-metoo. Of course, given how things are going culturally at the moment—in the sense that we still can’t agree that sexual assault is bad—I’m not really sure we need exploitative/toxic/borderline abusive relationships further complicated. But, in other ways, perhaps we do: because when you’re fighting over basics you flatten everything to being the same thing.
Also WDWWDITD does end in a place of hope and optimism, essentially tearing down its own central conceit, to allow its heroine back into the light.
Relevant disclaimers: none
Please note: This review may not be reproduced or quoted, in whole or in part, without explicit consent from the author.
And remember: I am not here to judge your drag, I mean your book. Books are art and art is subjective. These are just my personal thoughts. They are not meant to be taken as broader commentary on the general quality of the work. Believe me, I have not enjoyed many an excellent book, and my individual lack of enjoyment has not made any of those books less excellent or (more relevantly) less successful.
Further disclaimer: Readers, please stop accusing me of trying to take down “my competition” because I wrote a review you didn’t like. This is complete nonsense. Firstly, writing isn’t a competitive sport. Secondly, I only publish reviews of books in the subgenre where I’m best known (queer romcom) if they’re glowing. And finally: taking time out of my life to read an entire book, then write a detailed review about it that some people on GR will look at would be a profoundly inefficient and ineffective way to damage the careers of other authors. If you can’t credit me with simply being a person who loves books and likes talking about them, at least credit me with enough common sense to be a better villain.
*******************************************
Oh God, I never know what to do with litfic. I just think it’s hard to really engage meaningfully in a book you know you’re supposed to admire and be impressed by. I mean, I’m not saying I didn’t admire this, nor that I wasn’t impressed by it … it’s just y’know. It’s litfic? Honestly, I think I might just have genre writer’s resentment because litfic tends to position not as a genre (which it is) but as kind of unquestioned default for fiction in general. Because litfic is the white cishet man of genre fiction. Which I guess makes sense, because it’s mostly written by cishet white men.
In any case, We Do What We Do in The Dark (not to be confused with How Hight We Go in the Dark or, I guess, What We Do In The Shadows, though I would 100% read a version of this book that also contained vampires) is neither written by nor about a cishet white man which is probably why I was willing to read it at all. It’s heroine, Mallory, is a lonely lesbian whose childhood is overshadowed by her mother’s slow death from cancer and whose college years are dominated by a single relationship. Well, I say relationship, it’s more of an affair—with an older, married professor the text refers to only as “the woman.” This, in itself, is interesting because I can easily see a text, written by a different author about different things, where this was an act of power, control, objectification and dehumanisation. In WDWWDITD it gives “the woman” a sort of mythic resonance. It reflects both her power over Mallory and her ultimately unknowability to Mallory.
The book spans several time periods in Mallory’s life, though it moves through them non-chronologically, starting first at college, with her affair with the woman, then moving back to her adolescence, then to the aftermath of college, when the woman reappears in her life once more, and finally into the more distant future. While this structure feels transparently … litficcy, it does encourage us to understand on Mallory’s life thematically rather than causally (instead of just “her mother died and this left her so sad and rootless she had an ill-advised affair”). The book is relentlessly focused on Mallory’s interiority, it’s perspective claustrophobically confined to hers. I’m kind of a bit startled by all the reviews being like, “easy beach read” because, I mean, this is a story about grief and loneliness, the way they intersect with and shape love and desire. It’s a story about a relationship that, while it’s definitely consensual, should also make any reasonable person uncomfortable (as, I think it is meant to). And, yes, the prose has a simplicity to it but it’s deceptive simplicity:
“Mallory realized this was how the woman was: she at once withheld and invited. The woman fulfilled so many of Mallory’s wants but left so many wants unfulfilled that the feeling of wanting in and of itself became desirable. There was an untouchable intensity, or an intense untouchability, to keeping a secret, to having a continuous crush, that Mallory wanted never to lose.”
I mean, I don’t know. That isn’t really shouting relaxing summer afternoon to me? But that could just be just me.
I’m also growing increasingly concerned that I’ve written one of those reviews I really don’t like: like, where review writer clearly was resistant to the book on principle, but then grudgingly had to concede its merit. I do not want to be that arsehole. And at least WDWWDITD wasn’t about sad gay men dying alone in Florida.
So let me try again to be fairer: this is an intriguing, deftly written book that explores several extremely complicated subjects—the loss of a parent, a relationship with an unaddressably unequal power imbalance—with nuance and depth. On top of which, the fact that the relationship in question is sapphic offers new perspective on an old subject, confronts us with different questions, for example the fact that we tend to be more forgiving of age/experience disparities in queer relationships. Despite the fact that there’s academic connection between Mallory and the woman, it would be hard to avoid the potentially toxic and exploitative implications of their relationship if the woman was a man. But, as a queer woman, Mallory herself lacks the same cultural framework.
Speaking of Mallory’s identity, while the woman herself is very clear that she is not “like Mallory”, and pursues mainly relationships with men, in and out of matrimony, Mallory is gay goes on to have further relationships with woman and is understood to be gay by most people in her life, so even though it contributes to her sense of isolation it is not, in reality, a source of rejection or prejudice for her. I found this a subtle take on the impact of queerness of a life as lived, especially in a world where it’s not supposed to be a problem any more per se: which is to say, it’s both significant and non-significant for Mallory, and is yet another complicating factor in her relationship with the woman. On the one side we have age, experience, and straightness, all the trappings of a stable heteronormative existence. On the other, youth, inexperience, queerness, and—due to the loss of her mother—a breaking down of family dynamics and the traditional support structures we tend to take for granted.
I guess if I had to put labels on this book, I’d call its sensibility post-queer and post-metoo. Of course, given how things are going culturally at the moment—in the sense that we still can’t agree that sexual assault is bad—I’m not really sure we need exploitative/toxic/borderline abusive relationships further complicated. But, in other ways, perhaps we do: because when you’re fighting over basics you flatten everything to being the same thing.
Also WDWWDITD does end in a place of hope and optimism, essentially tearing down its own central conceit, to allow its heroine back into the light.
March 9, 2023
if you are A) sad, B) queer, C) tortured and D) live most of your life feeling like you have 0 identity… this book is for you. cerebral, very quotable, short and respectful of your time (200 pages!).
this is a lesbian litfic story that follows mallory, a college student who has an affair with a much older professor.
it’s about the affair, yes—but the more interesting parts to me are about mallory’s obsession with the older woman, not just in terms of lust but also in terms of wanting to remodel herself and her life in the image of someone who to her is magnetic, effortlessly brilliant, and capable of making sense out of a world that is often senseless. the major conceit of this, of course, is that nobody is as untouchable as they seem.
great prose and pacing for the most part but i found a longer flashback section towards the middle to drag the book a bit for me. i also wish it had ended a bit differently--though i feel that way about a lot of litfic, so that may just be a me thing. i still found this to be an intriguing read, and this feels like the kind of book where as it continues to knock around my head as i am certain it will i may come to like it even more.
3.5, could easily be a 5 for you if it Hits.
this is a lesbian litfic story that follows mallory, a college student who has an affair with a much older professor.
it’s about the affair, yes—but the more interesting parts to me are about mallory’s obsession with the older woman, not just in terms of lust but also in terms of wanting to remodel herself and her life in the image of someone who to her is magnetic, effortlessly brilliant, and capable of making sense out of a world that is often senseless. the major conceit of this, of course, is that nobody is as untouchable as they seem.
great prose and pacing for the most part but i found a longer flashback section towards the middle to drag the book a bit for me. i also wish it had ended a bit differently--though i feel that way about a lot of litfic, so that may just be a me thing. i still found this to be an intriguing read, and this feels like the kind of book where as it continues to knock around my head as i am certain it will i may come to like it even more.
3.5, could easily be a 5 for you if it Hits.
June 23, 2022
✧ ↝ 4.25 stars | 81% |
this was emotionally draining but not in a obvious, tragic kind of lost love way, just passively emotionally draining throughout nearly the whole book.
this reminded me of All My Mother’s Lovers, which is another sad gay girl literary fiction book but it was similar beyond that; as the main characters reminded me a lot of each other and the vibes were very much in sync.
when i first started reading this, i had the sense that i would finish it quickly and i couldn’t put it down etc etc, and as the story went on it became increasingly harder to not put the book down and to finish it fast, because at times it just became too much and too emotionally draining that it put me in the kind of space it was trying to show in its characters; that kind of melancholy depressed state of thinking too much about the world.
i liked how this book wasn’t overly dramatic with the affair other than the sad dramatics the main character had in her head to make herself satisfied with something that was not necessarily as epic as she felt it was. however, being similar to the main character, i would’ve liked some emotional dramatics that would’ve left me feeling damaged and empty but overall left me feeling more.
this was extremely impressive for a debut, there were so many good quotes etc so this was very good for annotating and the writing was perfect for the type of book that this is. i was anticipating this to be five stars and emotionally gut-wrenching and it wasn’t but i appreciate what it was just the same. (btw props to me for not going back into my reading slump by reading a literary fiction book.)
this was emotionally draining but not in a obvious, tragic kind of lost love way, just passively emotionally draining throughout nearly the whole book.
this reminded me of All My Mother’s Lovers, which is another sad gay girl literary fiction book but it was similar beyond that; as the main characters reminded me a lot of each other and the vibes were very much in sync.
when i first started reading this, i had the sense that i would finish it quickly and i couldn’t put it down etc etc, and as the story went on it became increasingly harder to not put the book down and to finish it fast, because at times it just became too much and too emotionally draining that it put me in the kind of space it was trying to show in its characters; that kind of melancholy depressed state of thinking too much about the world.
i liked how this book wasn’t overly dramatic with the affair other than the sad dramatics the main character had in her head to make herself satisfied with something that was not necessarily as epic as she felt it was. however, being similar to the main character, i would’ve liked some emotional dramatics that would’ve left me feeling damaged and empty but overall left me feeling more.
this was extremely impressive for a debut, there were so many good quotes etc so this was very good for annotating and the writing was perfect for the type of book that this is. i was anticipating this to be five stars and emotionally gut-wrenching and it wasn’t but i appreciate what it was just the same. (btw props to me for not going back into my reading slump by reading a literary fiction book.)
January 26, 2024
I haven't read a book that did such a good job doing exactly what it set out to do in a long time. A melancholy character study of a young woman whose mother recently passed away who has a life-changing affair in her first year of college with an older woman professor. I gobbled this up in a couple days. I was tempted many times to record some of the turns of phrase in Hart's beautiful but sparse writing but decided to just stay in the moment and keep reading. An incredible book, especially for a debut. Also: perfect last sentence.
January 11, 2023
Look, I'm a lesbian, I have a thing for older women, I have a thing for books about the crushingly lonely experience of being a young woman, let alone a young lesbian woman. I feel all that, I see all that, I respect all that. But I can't really respect We Do What We Do in the Dark. The reasons for why I can't really respect this book are threefold.
Number one. The prose in this book is, for the most part, godawful. It is really interesting to me how Hart manages to write a book that is both completely overly mundane, yet contains some of the clunkiest metaphors I have ever read and a screaming lack of 'show, don't tell'. Instead of saying "this made the character feel X and Y", you could show them reacting in a way that exhibits X and Y. It feels like Hart is underestimating her readers, not believing that we can infer emotions from the way a person is acting without needing to say "this character is now upset". The writing style here is SO flat, yet once in a while Hart manages to hit me with a metaphor that is just so useless I wish it wasn't there - one of the worst offenders for me was something along the lines of "her mother's hair was now the color of coffee diluted with too much milk", which is a lot of words that do not invoke any kind of mental image one is able to grasp. The writing was also incredibly stunted by the fact that the main character's love interest, the older woman, was never given a name. She was simply 'the woman', and boy does it get exhausting to see 'the woman' repeated countless time on every page. The dialogue is also extremely unnatural, and while it is definitely its own art to write dialogue that feels genuinely believable and natural, it felt like this book didn't even try to be those things.
Number two. The structure of this novel feels off. I love it when a book can seamlessly weave together backstory with the ongoing plot of the novel. We Do What We Do in the Dark does the literal opposite, in that Hart does not give our main character, Mallory, any significant backstory for the first almost 100 pages of the novel, then tacks on a flashback chapter of 50-something pages in which we learn that Mallory...had a friend as a kid? Sold pot? Smoked said pot with said friend's mom? It was really hard for me to care about any of it because Mallory's backstory did not come out naturally, it was not woven into her personality, so it ultimately gave no real insight into who she is. Everything was just kind of inconsequential. The main relationship at heart of the novel also had no real time to develop because Hart completely rushed through how the relationship came to be. I didn't really see why I should care about a relationship that seemed like it came out of thin air.
Number three, and the most damning of all. The relationship at the center of the book and the two women who were in said relationship. God, I cannot remember the last time I read about characters with less personality, who rang less true, than these two. Mallory is any girl. Hart brings forth nothing that I could say is distinctly Mallory, nothing that differentiates her in my mind from anyone. You could pluck her out and replace her with anyone else and you wouldn't know because it's impossible to say who Mallory is. And yes, she is a young woman, 18 at the start of the book, 28 at the end, but as someone who is an age between those two numbers and has recently been many other ages between those two numbers, that is no excuse. Everyone is lost in their 20s, but there's still SOMETHING to hold on to. People don't just go through life as wet blankets until they're 30 or 50. And speaking of 30 or 50, 'the woman', the older woman, was, to Hart's credit, given a bit of personality. In that she is German and makes children's books. Is this personality, or are these just facts about her? I'm leaning towards the latter, because the woman hardly had any personality. Literally all Mallory could do to cling on to her was to read children's books and learn German. That's all she had going for her, which, to be fair, is still way more than Mallory had going for her.
So, no, I did not enjoy this book very much. I'd go as far as to say I did not enjoy this book at all. Two books into 2023 and we already have a 5-star and a 1-star read. We love diversity!
Number one. The prose in this book is, for the most part, godawful. It is really interesting to me how Hart manages to write a book that is both completely overly mundane, yet contains some of the clunkiest metaphors I have ever read and a screaming lack of 'show, don't tell'. Instead of saying "this made the character feel X and Y", you could show them reacting in a way that exhibits X and Y. It feels like Hart is underestimating her readers, not believing that we can infer emotions from the way a person is acting without needing to say "this character is now upset". The writing style here is SO flat, yet once in a while Hart manages to hit me with a metaphor that is just so useless I wish it wasn't there - one of the worst offenders for me was something along the lines of "her mother's hair was now the color of coffee diluted with too much milk", which is a lot of words that do not invoke any kind of mental image one is able to grasp. The writing was also incredibly stunted by the fact that the main character's love interest, the older woman, was never given a name. She was simply 'the woman', and boy does it get exhausting to see 'the woman' repeated countless time on every page. The dialogue is also extremely unnatural, and while it is definitely its own art to write dialogue that feels genuinely believable and natural, it felt like this book didn't even try to be those things.
Number two. The structure of this novel feels off. I love it when a book can seamlessly weave together backstory with the ongoing plot of the novel. We Do What We Do in the Dark does the literal opposite, in that Hart does not give our main character, Mallory, any significant backstory for the first almost 100 pages of the novel, then tacks on a flashback chapter of 50-something pages in which we learn that Mallory...had a friend as a kid? Sold pot? Smoked said pot with said friend's mom? It was really hard for me to care about any of it because Mallory's backstory did not come out naturally, it was not woven into her personality, so it ultimately gave no real insight into who she is. Everything was just kind of inconsequential. The main relationship at heart of the novel also had no real time to develop because Hart completely rushed through how the relationship came to be. I didn't really see why I should care about a relationship that seemed like it came out of thin air.
Number three, and the most damning of all. The relationship at the center of the book and the two women who were in said relationship. God, I cannot remember the last time I read about characters with less personality, who rang less true, than these two. Mallory is any girl. Hart brings forth nothing that I could say is distinctly Mallory, nothing that differentiates her in my mind from anyone. You could pluck her out and replace her with anyone else and you wouldn't know because it's impossible to say who Mallory is. And yes, she is a young woman, 18 at the start of the book, 28 at the end, but as someone who is an age between those two numbers and has recently been many other ages between those two numbers, that is no excuse. Everyone is lost in their 20s, but there's still SOMETHING to hold on to. People don't just go through life as wet blankets until they're 30 or 50. And speaking of 30 or 50, 'the woman', the older woman, was, to Hart's credit, given a bit of personality. In that she is German and makes children's books. Is this personality, or are these just facts about her? I'm leaning towards the latter, because the woman hardly had any personality. Literally all Mallory could do to cling on to her was to read children's books and learn German. That's all she had going for her, which, to be fair, is still way more than Mallory had going for her.
So, no, I did not enjoy this book very much. I'd go as far as to say I did not enjoy this book at all. Two books into 2023 and we already have a 5-star and a 1-star read. We love diversity!
September 2, 2022
"You and I, we do what we do in the dark and then we deal with it all alone"
This reads factually, like an outside observer following Mallory at different important stages of her life.
We both do and do not understand Mallory. We see the world through her eyes but the way one perceives a character like Mallory is dependent on our own experiences.
The affair is the central part of the story, but like any major event in one's life, it is just one of many impactful events that occur in one's life.
This book felt so deeply personal to me that I cannot leave a normal review for it.
June 10, 2022
a short, engrossing novel about a young queer woman navigating life and adult relationships amidst reckoning with the grief of her mother’s death. largely, this book focuses on both the intersection and difference between aloneness and loneliness, especially as a queer person. tonally, it kinda reminded me of a mix of exciting times x milk fed x conversations with friends x vladimir
May 20, 2023
Never related to a main character more
May 6, 2024
everytime i come across a loser ass lonely ass queer protagonist and swear i'm not gonna be able to relate to that bitch i do.................... what does that mean
3.5
3.5
May 8, 2022
A little too on-the-nose for me. It seemed like the book was run by a therapist for their stamp of approval? Fans of psychoanalysis and well-placed symbolism might be rewarded by these pages, but I don’t like for the books I read to be so A->B. Every anecdote served an explicit purpose (to support the themes of the narrative). I want some detours on my drives...
That said, I deeply admire Michelle Hart and everything she’s done for queer authors and books. This is a technically gorgeous book; just not my style.
That said, I deeply admire Michelle Hart and everything she’s done for queer authors and books. This is a technically gorgeous book; just not my style.
March 25, 2022
Mallory has an affair with a college teacher. The woman is never named. It really felt like it had no plot.
It’s kind of depressing.
https://theworldisabookandiamitsreade...
It’s kind of depressing.
https://theworldisabookandiamitsreade...
September 16, 2023
“You and I,” she said, “we do what we do in the dark and then we deal with it all alone.”
This book is about Mallory and how, in the first semester of her freshman year in college started an affair with a married adjunct professor. Interesting that the person Mallory has the fixation about is only ever called “The Woman”, another name is never used. Mallory initially sees The Woman in the gym, and Mallory becomes a regular at the gym to to be able to watch The Woman on the treadmill and eventually has a conversation with her that ultimately leads to the beginning of the affair, All we know about The Woman is that she is > twice Mallory’s age (so at least 37), is also a writer of children’s books and is married to a professor at the same college who is away on sabbatical.
The book’s focus is on Mallory, and why she is the way that she is, how she wanted to keep her sexual preferences to herself, and actually how she wants to keep pretty much everything about her, to herself. She is an only child, her best friend leaves to go to college and Mallory never hears from her again. Mallory struggles with loneliness …. and perhaps that is her connection with The Woman who has the same struggles.
She was a sad girl, a lonely girl, and, after a lifetime of practice, she had become so good at this that it had become the most appealing thing about her.
The book takes us through Mallory’s first year in college (the duration of the affair), and then checks in on high school Mallory and then later when she is 23 and lastly, when Mallory is 28.
The first 60 pages of this book were riveting. They are about the affair, and how The Woman perceived things, her guilt about the relationship but also how she relished the attention from Mallory. Mallory for her part, is infatuated. She sees The Woman as a sexual partner and a mentor. She is 18. Love is never mentioned.
After the end of the first year everything started to go south for me. We get details about Mallory’s teenage background and then see her after college. The story briefly touches on her current relationships along the way. At 23 Mallory sees the The Woman again but I never understood why those pages were necessary…if you haven’t seen someone in 5 years do you need to tell the reader things aren’t the same anymore?
Honestly, I’m a careful reader, I don’t normally miss things but I feel like I missed something someplace.
Was this juxtaposition between professor and student supposed to be shocking because it was sapphic? (and not the usual male/female) Come on! . More concerning was the age difference. If the woman had been Mallory’s boss the power dynamic would have been concerning, but it is mentioned a couple of times that though The Woman was a professor she was never Mallory’s. Was The Woman a mother substitute…no ick…too many sexual encounters. We can go on and on speculating about what this book was really about and THAT is my point. What is it about?
I mean the story is just OK, but it didn’t deliver on the promise the first 60 pages laid out. For me, the rest of the book just didn’t hold up.
This book is about Mallory and how, in the first semester of her freshman year in college started an affair with a married adjunct professor. Interesting that the person Mallory has the fixation about is only ever called “The Woman”, another name is never used. Mallory initially sees The Woman in the gym, and Mallory becomes a regular at the gym to to be able to watch The Woman on the treadmill and eventually has a conversation with her that ultimately leads to the beginning of the affair, All we know about The Woman is that she is > twice Mallory’s age (so at least 37), is also a writer of children’s books and is married to a professor at the same college who is away on sabbatical.
The book’s focus is on Mallory, and why she is the way that she is, how she wanted to keep her sexual preferences to herself, and actually how she wants to keep pretty much everything about her, to herself. She is an only child, her best friend leaves to go to college and Mallory never hears from her again. Mallory struggles with loneliness …. and perhaps that is her connection with The Woman who has the same struggles.
She was a sad girl, a lonely girl, and, after a lifetime of practice, she had become so good at this that it had become the most appealing thing about her.
The book takes us through Mallory’s first year in college (the duration of the affair), and then checks in on high school Mallory and then later when she is 23 and lastly, when Mallory is 28.
The first 60 pages of this book were riveting. They are about the affair, and how The Woman perceived things, her guilt about the relationship but also how she relished the attention from Mallory. Mallory for her part, is infatuated. She sees The Woman as a sexual partner and a mentor. She is 18. Love is never mentioned.
After the end of the first year everything started to go south for me. We get details about Mallory’s teenage background and then see her after college. The story briefly touches on her current relationships along the way. At 23 Mallory sees the The Woman again but I never understood why those pages were necessary…if you haven’t seen someone in 5 years do you need to tell the reader things aren’t the same anymore?
Honestly, I’m a careful reader, I don’t normally miss things but I feel like I missed something someplace.
Was this juxtaposition between professor and student supposed to be shocking because it was sapphic? (and not the usual male/female) Come on! . More concerning was the age difference. If the woman had been Mallory’s boss the power dynamic would have been concerning, but it is mentioned a couple of times that though The Woman was a professor she was never Mallory’s. Was The Woman a mother substitute…no ick…too many sexual encounters. We can go on and on speculating about what this book was really about and THAT is my point. What is it about?
I mean the story is just OK, but it didn’t deliver on the promise the first 60 pages laid out. For me, the rest of the book just didn’t hold up.
May 8, 2022
4.5/5
An incredibly written debut about a young girl who has an affair with an older woman whilst she’s in her first year of college. Touches on desire, the need to be accepted and wanted, coming to terms with being queer, loneliness, grief and more
A great sad girl in the city rec. I was absolutely absorbed in this novel and enjoyed every second of it
An incredibly written debut about a young girl who has an affair with an older woman whilst she’s in her first year of college. Touches on desire, the need to be accepted and wanted, coming to terms with being queer, loneliness, grief and more
A great sad girl in the city rec. I was absolutely absorbed in this novel and enjoyed every second of it
July 1, 2022
4.5 wow i loved this, the way hart writes about loneliness/grief/desire in this is so beautifully done (draining, almost in a passive way (?) on the emotional end, like it gets very sad lol) but beautiful nonetheless. couldn’t put it down once i started.
December 13, 2021
It almost feels shameful to be face to face with another person’s abject want and vulnerability especially if you’re just peering into a relationship and not actually part of it. The story here left me breathless.
July 15, 2023
completely and utterly obsessed
May 2, 2022
Somewhere between 3 - 3.5
At points this was brilliant and at other times I felt somewhat underwhelmed by how distant I felt from what was happening. A queer coming-of-age story, the novel is expertly crafted by the author in respect of when we switch time frames to head back to Mallory's younger years - this really helped convey her emotional state and explain her reaction to certain events in the narrative. I thought that it was an interesting narrative choice to only tell the story of her formative relationship from the main character's perspective, as this often raised more questions than it answered, but I'm almost certain this was Hart's intention. I'll definitely be checking out the author's next novel.
Thank you Netgalley and Headline for the advance copy, which was provided in exchange for an honest review.
At points this was brilliant and at other times I felt somewhat underwhelmed by how distant I felt from what was happening. A queer coming-of-age story, the novel is expertly crafted by the author in respect of when we switch time frames to head back to Mallory's younger years - this really helped convey her emotional state and explain her reaction to certain events in the narrative. I thought that it was an interesting narrative choice to only tell the story of her formative relationship from the main character's perspective, as this often raised more questions than it answered, but I'm almost certain this was Hart's intention. I'll definitely be checking out the author's next novel.
Thank you Netgalley and Headline for the advance copy, which was provided in exchange for an honest review.
July 2, 2023
It was okay, I enjoyed the build up but something about the main character was a bit off for me. I didn't really like her. It felt like it was a real slow burner as well, which didn't hold my interest.
I received this book from a Goodreads Giveaway. All of the statements above are my true opinions after fully reading this book.
I received this book from a Goodreads Giveaway. All of the statements above are my true opinions after fully reading this book.
January 3, 2024
I really need to stop staying up until the early hours finishing books.
******
Coming back three months later because I think I owe this book a coherent review.
The basics (in case you don't want to read my ramblings):
- I read this in one night
- I loved it
- A lot of the inspiration for the novel I'm trying to write comes from this book
Full review:
This book was amazing, and I cannot stress this enough. It was just the right blend of distant and deeply personal to make it stand out to me.
I was originally recommended this by the GR algorithm when I reviewed a 'similar' book. I was interested in the plot from the start and I looked at a 5 page preview on Google books to see if it was worth it (it was) and the scene I read about in the preview was stuck in my head all weekend, so I put the book on my priority tbr almost immediately. As soon as I had the chance, I went out and bought it, and it did not disappoint.
I felt so attached to Mallory for the entire book, yet the experience also felt dreamy and distant because of the fact that most of Mallory's interactions were with the woman, which made this book seem as though it took place far, far away from the world. I think the use of third person was perfect, and I really don't think any other author (at least that I have read) has captured this feeling in anywhere near the way that Michelle Hart has managed to.
Also, as a teenager myself, I felt like the section about Mallory's childhood was very accurate, in the sense that it put into words the feeling of drifting, and trying to fit in whilst everything changes around you. I found this section probably the saddest of the entire book, and I loved the way that it sort of explained why Mallory needed the woman.
A lot of people automatically associate sad books with an atmosphere of complete bleakness, but I feel like We Do What We Do In The Dark was just the right amount of melancholy to have me still thinking about it weeks later. I kept telling myself that the ending was happy (because it was happy, or at least hopeful) but I couldn't stop being sad about it because of the characters I chose to invest in. And this book is another one where I knew the ending (when I tried to check the triggers, it gave me spoilers) yet I still had very strong, unexpected feelings about it.
If and when Michelle Hart writes another book, it will most definitely be an instant buy for me. The writing was beautiful without being heavy and weighing down the story, and I won't even bother to describe anything else about it, because all it will entail is me using the word 'beautiful' over and over again. The bottom line is: I think this book deserves a lot more attention than it gets and I will tell everyone who is willing to listen about it.
******
Coming back three months later because I think I owe this book a coherent review.
The basics (in case you don't want to read my ramblings):
- I read this in one night
- I loved it
- A lot of the inspiration for the novel I'm trying to write comes from this book
Full review:
This book was amazing, and I cannot stress this enough. It was just the right blend of distant and deeply personal to make it stand out to me.
I was originally recommended this by the GR algorithm when I reviewed a 'similar' book. I was interested in the plot from the start and I looked at a 5 page preview on Google books to see if it was worth it (it was) and the scene I read about in the preview was stuck in my head all weekend, so I put the book on my priority tbr almost immediately. As soon as I had the chance, I went out and bought it, and it did not disappoint.
I felt so attached to Mallory for the entire book, yet the experience also felt dreamy and distant because of the fact that most of Mallory's interactions were with the woman, which made this book seem as though it took place far, far away from the world. I think the use of third person was perfect, and I really don't think any other author (at least that I have read) has captured this feeling in anywhere near the way that Michelle Hart has managed to.
Also, as a teenager myself, I felt like the section about Mallory's childhood was very accurate, in the sense that it put into words the feeling of drifting, and trying to fit in whilst everything changes around you. I found this section probably the saddest of the entire book, and I loved the way that it sort of explained why Mallory needed the woman.
A lot of people automatically associate sad books with an atmosphere of complete bleakness, but I feel like We Do What We Do In The Dark was just the right amount of melancholy to have me still thinking about it weeks later. I kept telling myself that the ending was happy (because it was happy, or at least hopeful) but I couldn't stop being sad about it because of the characters I chose to invest in. And this book is another one where I knew the ending (when I tried to check the triggers, it gave me spoilers) yet I still had very strong, unexpected feelings about it.
If and when Michelle Hart writes another book, it will most definitely be an instant buy for me. The writing was beautiful without being heavy and weighing down the story, and I won't even bother to describe anything else about it, because all it will entail is me using the word 'beautiful' over and over again. The bottom line is: I think this book deserves a lot more attention than it gets and I will tell everyone who is willing to listen about it.
January 12, 2024
i loved reading this book but it struck a chord in me that i didn’t expect. there were many quotes that i would love to go back to and remember. i also would like to properly analyze it because i had so many thoughts about mallory, the woman, and their relationship. it was a story that i felt i could relate to in a lot of ways and was a story that made me re-think situations in my own life. it was interesting to watch mallory grow and see her slowly start to form a sense of self after relying on someone to guide her during the most formative years of her life. the people and relationships you have affect you for the rest of your life. it’s okay to hold onto remnants of relationships but it’s not okay to let them control you. especially in their dynamic. mallory was not truly herself. she was always trying to be someone else to impress the woman. she found no purpose in life besides the woman and always lived as if she was watching. she held onto her for a long time and continues too. the woman will never leave her mind but she doesn’t have to control it. experiences and relationships like this shape you in a way that never leaves but it’s important to grow around it.
July 23, 2023
“I’m afraid of being alone and afraid that is the only way I know how to be.”
It’s the most bizarre feeling reading my mental, emotional and social self as a younger person communicated in a book. It was like déjà vu but backwards. It was so very similar it felt eerie.
Michelle Hart presented the story in a way that reminded me of queer books from the early 90’s to late 2000’s where the story was said plainly, none of the frills and fluff common in modern queer stories, and I love it! I could describe the author’s talent with words as cunning. Her tools were ordinary words but surgical in its precision in conjuring melancholic feelings and ideas as if reading a soulful poem by Dickens or Plath.
The Woman, whom the author didn’t bother to name, belied the permanence in Mallory’s life. However transient, it was a needed occurrence for Mallory to find her way through her own happiness and life.
It’s the most bizarre feeling reading my mental, emotional and social self as a younger person communicated in a book. It was like déjà vu but backwards. It was so very similar it felt eerie.
Michelle Hart presented the story in a way that reminded me of queer books from the early 90’s to late 2000’s where the story was said plainly, none of the frills and fluff common in modern queer stories, and I love it! I could describe the author’s talent with words as cunning. Her tools were ordinary words but surgical in its precision in conjuring melancholic feelings and ideas as if reading a soulful poem by Dickens or Plath.
The Woman, whom the author didn’t bother to name, belied the permanence in Mallory’s life. However transient, it was a needed occurrence for Mallory to find her way through her own happiness and life.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 2,318 reviews