GREEN DOT

After embarking on her first grown-up job, an idealistic 20-something begins an affair with a married colleague.

Hera Stephen, 24, lives with her father in Sydney, Australia. She’s used grad school to delay adulthood as long as possible, but now it’s time for her to join the ranks of her corporate friends and get a “real job.” After several disastrously frank interviews, she takes a position as a news organization’s comment moderator, where her soul-sucking responsibility is to read, parse, and color-code the vitriol of online discussions. It’s at this job that she meets Arthur Jones, a soft-spoken journalist with whom she starts up a message-based flirtation (hence the title, referencing the green dot that indicates a user is online). By the time Hera finds out that Arthur is married, it’s already too late—she’s enamored. Gray’s writing skillfully captures the passion of their early trysts. The sex scenes crackle with energy, and the chemistry between Hera and Arthur is believable and seductive. You may find yourself rooting for them against your better instincts, even as Hera begins to neglect her friends and her delightful, supportive father. As the book tracks the increasingly doomed love affair (including through the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic), the only thing keeping the narrative from devolving into something grim and cynical is Hera’s dynamic and snarky voice. She addresses the reader directly at times, preempting any criticism and attempting to mitigate her own bad decisions. Her narration is peppered with references to music and pop culture, the things that define your personality in your 20s, when you’re still searching, as Hera is, for some kind of identity. Just as much of the narrative unfolds digitally as it does IRL, and Gray deftly incorporates FaceTime, Instagram, and an unnamed company chat platform into the text.

A breezy, heartfelt coming-of-age story for Gen Zers concerned with how to grow up without growing cold.