B+
Genre: Contemporary Romance, Romance
Theme: Forced Proximity (stranded, safehouse, etc)
Archetype: Escort/Courtesan/Sex Worker
The Roommate is a sex-positive, contemporary romance debut that has given me something I’ve been searching for : romantic leads who are involved in sex work (minus all of the shame and slut-shaming). I’m happy to say that The Roommate delivered on that front, and the romance was rather cute, too, despite being slightly different than what I was expecting.
Clara is having a late-stage rebellious phase. She’s a socialite from a wealthy, conservative family and has led a rather sheltered life. When she gets the chance to run off to Los Angeles and become the roommate to her lifelong crush (and give up an internship at the Guggenheim), she takes it. Unfortunately, that crush has done a bit of a bait and switch. His band is about to go on tour and he apparently has no problems leaving Clara to manage settling into the West Coast on her own. OH AND LIVE WITH A STRANGE MAN SHE’S NEVER MET.
If it were me, that friendship would be over.
Clara is upset and briefly entertains the idea of going back to New York, but decides to stick it out in LA for the summer. While having an understandable pity party at her new apartment, she meets Josh, the stranger who is also her roommate now:
The faded wallpaper exuded kitschy charm, fighting for her affection, but she couldn’t shake the crushing weight of her disappointment. Clara wiped off the seat of the sofa before sitting down.
“So this is how it feels to be well and truly fucked.”
“I get that a lot,” said a low voice behind her.
Talk about an entrance!
Josh really is adorable and has that boy next door charm. But, you know, he could still be a serial killer. Clara does a cursory Google and finds out that Josh is an adult film star. To sum up: he catches her watching one of his videos, offers to give her a demonstration, and they have a hot fling.
I’m struggling to describe Clara because I feel like “prudish” isn’t an apt description, but she’s very much the kind of woman who was never really taught about her body. A lot of us have a complicated relationship centering our own pleasure or even knowing where to begin. That’s Clara, and Josh senses that she’s still exploring her sexuality. Those two things converge outside the bedroom when Clara and Josh embark on a business venture: she provides the funds and he provides the insight to produce adult videos that balance sexual exploration, education, and a woman’s pleasure.
Though the setup is worthy of a spicy montage with lots of upbeat synth, their business idea quickly gains a rival. Black Hat Studios, the company that currently holds Josh’s contract, is working to undermine their success and blackmail Josh into signing a new contract.
Honestly, it’s not where I thought the book was going and while I fully support Josh and Clara’s ultimate goal, the blackmail plot wasn’t my favorite. I would have much preferred focusing on Clara’s shedding of the shame and shackles of her upbringing, where reputation and appearances are prized and emphasized. That aspect of her character arc seems more aligned with the overall message of destigmatizing sex and sex work. If you’re curious whether Clara’s investment affects her family on the East Coast, or if that conflict is explored at all, the answer is no.
I wanted more for Clara when it came to navigating her privileged, sheltered upbringing and the way it stunted her own self-discovery. A friend of mine read this at the same time and expressed frustrations with some of Clara’s decisions, namely moving across the country for a man and giving up a great opportunity. But as someone who made a few bad decisions based on men in my early twenties (Clara is older than that), I get it. For me, Clara’s neuroses regarding her family never really materialize in ways that affect the romance. With all the worrying she does, it seemed like foreshadowing to a big confrontation that ultimately never happens.
Despite wishing for more resolution for conflicts that were halfheartedly introduced, I really did enjoy seeing Clara and Josh together. They’re opposites, but deep down, they’re still two goobers who really do like each other, which is something I think a lot of romance readers are really drawn to right now. People who are nice to one another?! What?! That’s porn in and of itself right now. Someone fan me!
Josh falls into beta hero cinnamon roll territory, who is incredibly in touch with his emotions and the emotions of his partner. He strikes a good balance between sweet and sexy; it’s the magic combination to get Clara to loosen up her typically tightly wound personality.
The next book, The Intimacy Experiment, features Naomi (who is a GODDESS amongst us mere mortals). She’s a porn star who helped co-found Josh and Clara’s start-up and is teaming up with a hot rabbi for a seminar on “modern intimacy.” I’m honestly ecstatic that the series will continue its exploration of sex work and sex workers.
When it comes to The Roommate, the biggest question is whether it lives up to the hype and I think it really depends on what you think you’re getting into. Is it a story that focuses on the heroine’s sexual self-exploration? Not enough for my tastes: the blackmail plot against Josh and Clara’s worries about social fallout that never materializes overshadow that part of the story, which was the part I most enjoyed. But is The Roommate a sex-positive, sexy, rompy rom-com? Yes, it is definitely that!
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Thanks!
Just discovered I already have this on hold at the library, with no memory of having done so. I like your take on it, Amanda, and look forward to reading it. Thanks.
I just read “A Flick between Friends” by Shae Sanders and, while it is a novella, it explores some of those dynamics around disclosing sex work to family and friends. It is more about the two main characters going from friends to more during the course of making a movie, and I found it a great, sex-positive story.
I also am waiting for my library hold on “Roommate” to come in. Looking forward to it!
This sounds marvelous! Looking forward to reading it!
I’m an outlier I think on this book, but at nearly 80% I’m not liking this one much. I struggle to find chemistry between the main couple and I was surprised by how quickly they leap into a sexual relationship. I struggle to believe that Clara departs from her life in Connecticut as a recently graduated doctoral student to a bohemian life in L.A. working on the outskirts of the porn industry. I feel as if the porn industry itself is highly sanitized and only a scapegoated villain portrays any measure of the exploitation in this work. I’m sadly just bored by all the sex scenes, though I think it is because I can’t feel the chemistry between the main couple. I do like the kindness of Josh and I also like the focus on sex positivity, especially for women, many of whom are still taught so little about their bodies. I suspect though that this author just isn’t for me.
I also felt that serious themes were introduced and not fully explored and that irked me. I agree with everything @Blackjack said – did not feel the chemistry, and the sanitization of porn was silly. Author found a way for Josh not to actually work while he is getting to know Clara and that felt like a cop out. Clara was super unbelievable and I did not see why Josh liked her, nor why she liked him (beyond physical attraction). I was super disappointed and I don’t think I will pick up the next book.
The question I keep coming back to after reading this book is “what politician do I admire enough to treat someone I love like garbage?” When Clara runs into the DA she admires at the movies while on a date with Josh she straight up pretends not to know him. This scene is rough in so many ways. First of all this politician is there with her staff as a break for them which we’re supposed to find charming but to paraphrase Dear Prudie, ‘after hours office parties are unpaid overtime’. Secondly, Josh lives and works and pays taxes in her district. If she finds the job he legally performs distasteful, as Clara assumes she will, then she sucks.
I agree that the heroine makes BAD choices- not at the beginning of the book (who cares about where a rich adult decides to take a summer vacation?) but throughout.
The business that her and Josh create is porn but with a narrator. NOBODY ASKED FOR THIS. I visualize the 1995 sex ed. videos still playing in 7th grade health classes but with real naked people who could just be making regular porn without a voice explaining it? It’s also presented as THE ONLY female led, non exploitative porn company which feels like erasure of all of the women directors and producers who have done the work IRL.
At first when it’s set up that she has history degrees because she’s good at art (not how that works) and he only has his voice rights I thought they would do a cartoon like ‘Oh Joy, Sex Toy’. Nope. Just regular porn with a voiceover mansplaining.
I CAN NOT get over the fact that her nepotism made-up job that she finds so serious and Important is basically an internship for a PR firm in Malibu that’s been outsourced as consultants for an L.A. DA candidate. Do you know how visibly TERRIBLE you can be and still get elected to DA in Los Angeles? If an intern at an outside PR firm had a side hustle as an investor in a pornography studio it would be the 1,000th craziest thing about that candidate in any election year. What PR firm did Jackie Lacey use when her husband pointed a gun at peaceful protesters last summer? Any interns with interesting investments?
to me, the whole subplot with the aunt’s PR firm is completely unnecessary to the book. The idea that a successful A-list hollywood firm would be salivating to break into local politics is goofy but Clara’s take on the Aunt’s back story was GROSS.
bahaha! What a long, weird late-night tangent for a relatively inoffensive first book. I wish there was a way to delete your own comments on here