Episode 52: We All Deserve French Seams — The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang

Break out your graphing calculators for this one y’all. Celebrated for its depiction of a non-neurotypical heroine, econometrician Stella Lane is on a quest to become a more competent lover when family pressure nudges her back onto the dating field. Enter Michael Larsen, a Vietnamese/Swedish sex worker and breadwinner for a large family and ailing mother: who better to help Stella spend her audacious salary on a trial run at intimacy? But despite the cutesy cover and inclusive narratives, there’s a kernel of Romance’s dark foundation lurking in this reverse Pretty Woman.

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