'You Know You Want This' by Kristen Roupenian

Review by Kate Jones

Many people will be familiar with Kristen Roupenian’s short story ‘Cat Person’, which went viral in 2017 after it was published online in The New Yorker.

​The story caused much debate. There were those who claimed that the story’s female narrator, Margot, was a middle-class privileged white girl; arguments that Margot’s internal dialogue about the older man Robert, whom she is involved in a flirtation with, amounted to fat shaming; as well as doubts over whether Robert is a villain or a hero.

The arguments actually reflect a lot of the thoughts and internal debates Margot has with herself as she narrates the somewhat odd relationship they have. She feels both affection and disgust over Robert. There is also a deep sense of foreboding as the story develops, and the power moves back and forth between them. Red flags are going up all over the place, and I genuinely couldn’t see where the story was going.

Whichever side of the Twitter debate you come down on, ‘Cat Person’ and the other stories that appear in this debut collection reveal a fresh new voice in short fiction. They also reveal the seedy underside to sexual politics, dating and modern women’s lives. The narrative voice reminded me a little of Rebecca Schiff’s debut collection The Bed Moved, in their portrayal of young women navigating life in the 21st Century.

The book itself, unusually for such a collection, is labelled ‘horror’ because of its dark content and often repelling, but always fascinating, themes. Definitely not a collection for the sensitive reader: my heart was racing along with the narrative of these stories.

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You Know You Want This (2019) is published by Jonathan Cape.