Eat My Heart Out

March 9, 2015
The literary debut of feminist scholar and art critic Pilger has drawn much applause for its audacious narrator and her posh, darkly comic world in the U.K., where it was published in 2014. American readers can now meet the millennial antithesis to Bridget Jones: Pilger’s protagonist, 23-year-old Ann-Marie, didn’t finish her degree, can’t hold down a hostess gig, and systematically destroys every one of her romantic prospects, including Sebastian, the ex she obsesses over. In lieu of a diary, we see into Ann-Marie’s wicked-smart, increasingly desperate brain via texts and emails, as well as into her book bag—in which she carries tomes by Heidegger and Falling Out of Fate, by feminist writer Stephanie Haight. We rush along with Ann-Marie as she flails through a series of self-destructive flings; gets herself booted out of the townhouse she shares with her friend Freddie, the scion of a wealthy family pursuing post-Hirsch-style art; and finds herself subjected to (and rejecting) Haight’s self-styled boot camp. With this electric romp of a novel, Pilger turns a neon light on to the intersection of romantic love and feminism.

March 15, 2015
Gleeful weirdness and vicious satire come together in a debut novel that follows an awful yet surprisingly likable young woman as she attempts to navigate the painful confusions of love, herself, and other people.Ann-Marie is 23 and discontent with everything. Tormented by the end of a long-term relationship and at loose ends after leaving the rarefied world of Cambridge, she lives in London, working haphazardly at a fancy restaurant and staying with her friend Freddie in a lavish apartment that belongs to his uncle. She's frequently ridiculous, to the point of seeming both unhinged and unbelievable-she pounces on strange men, acting seductive and then killing the mood with mad gestures like extinguishing a cigarette on his chest-but her desperate search for substance and creeping terror that she won't find it, or will fail to recognize it if she does, give the novel an attractive feeling of dark reality. Pilger's vivid depiction of Anne-Marie's self-conscious dissatisfaction pulls the reader along as the character is plunged into ever more absurd situations. She meets a celebrated feminist author, Stephanie Haight, and falls into the role of ill-behaved disciple to her provocative and abusive teachings. She runs to and from a social circle of spoiled, drug-addled, hipster youth, giving Pilger an opportunity for biting depictions of the silliest excesses of artistic and academic posturing. The novel bangs on the theme of the dangers of obsession with romantic love; the characters are aware of this obsession, dissect it, and fall prey to it. Pilger's efforts to skewer that obsession are funny but bleak, offering little to alleviate the nastiness and discomfort except for breezily conversational writing occasionally interrupted by strikingly grotesque imagery. A darkly funny, outrageous, and unromantic novel about a young woman obsessed with love.

May 1, 2015
Pilger's debut novel takes an animated look at contemporary feminist ideology and relationships via the chaotic romps of Londoner Ann-Marie. Having dropped out of Cambridge after being cheated on by her longtime boyfriend, 23-year-old Ann-Marie is living rent-free with her flamboyant artist friend, Freddie, and lusting after dull operations-manager Vic, whom she imagines to be a war criminal. To make ends meet, Ann-Marie slugs it out as a restaurant hostess in Soho. After that short-lived job goes awry, she seeks out famed feminist icon Stephanie Haight, an academic who rose to prominence during the second wave of the women's movement. Stephanie is quick to take Ann-Marie under her wing, and as their relationship evolves, they enact an unusual and sardonic dynamic. Though Stephanie is eager to expose Ann-Marie to her concepts of life in a postfeminist media culture, perhaps to her own self-serving benefit, Ann-Marie oscillates between Stephanie's domain and the pull of her contemporaries and her own unhinged impulses. Pilger's offbeat characters are particularly vivid, and the narrative's satirical elements provide balance to their raging extremes.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)