Leanne's Reviews > The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P.

So, I was pretty impressed that this was written by a woman, because it seemed scarily dead-on - and before I said that definitively, I had to look around and double check some reviews actually written by men, who seem to agree - whether or not they actually enjoyed the novel.

The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P. (or Nate) is a fascinating look into a hipster writer's Brooklyn, with plenty of social commentary - on upbringing, American cities, the college experience, and most of all, love. Some of the above I was just not on the mental level to agree or disagree with (I'm just not what you'd term an intellectual), but it was incredibly interesting all the same.

Nate is a self-absorbed Brooklynite who grew up in the Midwest but attended Harvard, moved to New York, and is now slowly rising in the literary scene, with a newly finished first novel and a six-figure advance. And he's finally getting the attention and recognition he's felt he deserved since high school that never quite materialized. The novel details his life as he tries to navigate through the complexities of the New York dating scene, and he works through a string of (for the most part) smart, attractive women that he starts out as heavily infatuated with and subsequently loses interest in.

Nate is obsessed with how others view his life - he disregards potential groups of friends because of his college roommate's distaste for them, he agonizes over dating certain girls - usually ones who aren't traditionally beautiful - because of what his friends might think (he's bothered more than once that his friends probably consider his current girlfriend only about a 7 on a 1-10 scale). He's often shallow and cowardly and hypocritical. And likely because of this, I've seen so many criticisms highlighting Nate's lack of likability, which I find so silly - to me, that is the entire draw of the novel. Who wouldn't want to peek inside the brain of someone like this? Isn't it fascinating to read about the inner workings of a mind so unlike yours, one that you've maybe encountered in the dating world and come off on the wrong side of?

It's simultaneously amusing and frustrating to read Nate's lengthy self-justifications for his contemptible behavior towards women. He's stuck in a vicious cycle. He wants to date someone independent and without low self-esteem, and he's suffocated by the thought of neediness and responsibility - but his behavior to counteract these fears causes the girl's insecurities in the first place, causes her to cling on and tolerate poor treatment. Which in turn triggers his annoyance that she would allow herself to be treated in such a way, that she's "self-victimizing". You just want to shake him, because you can see a glimmer of the potential he has to be more on the lovable side of the "lovable jerk", but he just ends up acting on his cruelest impulses.

If all of this sounds stuffy and unbearable, it's really not - mostly because of Adelle Waldman's simple yet effective prose. There's nothing flowery here, no grand descriptions, but it's direct and witty and clean. And I will definitely be picking up whatever she decides to write next.