Book Review: Ada Calhoun's 'Crush' is a personal essay on love disguised as a novel

Audio By Carbonatix

Ada Calhoun’s debut novel “Crush” is only a novel in the loosest sense. It’s really more of a well-sourced personal essay on love and relationships brilliantly disguised as a novel.

Coming out of the COVID-19 lockdowns with a severe lack of human connection, the story follows an unnamed narrator who craves attention and intimacy. When her husband, Paul, suggests they open their relationship so she can kiss other people, the narrator hesitantly agrees and soon finds her foray into sanctioned extramarital kissing completely invigorating. But when she reaches out to her college crush, David, their relationship quickly takes a life of its own and becomes an all-consuming, marriage-threatening soul connection.

“Crush” reads more like a series of journal entries or a friend telling a long-winded story over a handful of phone calls.

Between the hyper-specific events and details and the close similarities between the narrator and the author — her work in journalism and ghost-writing, her father’s death and even her fellowship at a Scottish castle — the novel takes on a non-fiction feel. Yet the nameless first-person perspective allows readers to embody the narrator and relate with her hopes, desires, and fears.

At first, an escapist story that reminds you what it’s like to feel on top of the world, the conversational writing style pulls you along at a rapid clip before you even realize you’re moving. Then hard reality comes crashing down and the pacing ebbs and flows.

Even though the plot points are predictable, the voice is ensnaring and leaves just enough doubt that you must read on to confirm your suspicions and see exactly how the seemingly inevitable will take place.

“Crush” is sometimes so dry or boring it’s funny; other times it's euphoric, magical or dramatic, and a breezy humor brushes most every page. Oodles of cultural references smatter the text, dropping references to literary classics and buzzy streaming shows alike. Calhoun makes the specific universal by pointing it all back toward the puzzle most of us spend our whole lives working out: love in its many forms. While it provides a plethora of ideas, it also leaves a lot up for discussion, making “Crush” an excellent pick for book clubs and self ponderance.

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