Games –Anna Maria Volkova

Economics and sex, yes there is a lot of both, but much, much more as well. New York is right on the page, and it’s so vivid I can clearly see all these places I’ve never been. Beautifully written and so well executed, this is not comforting romance, it’s visceral and hurtful and dramatic, and gobble-able in one sitting.

Lili is young, determined, opinionated and hungry for a break from the pressures of her academic – and real – life. Aleksandr is a successful risk analyst embedded in the economic system Lili despises. It's a generationally big age gap between them. This romance is so fresh, even if their experience is not – at least he isn’t married. After the hunger, they hurt each other, and Lili is so very good at that.

Anna Maria Volkova creates a persuasive happy-for-now, and it’s hard won for both Aleksandr and Lili, who have to let go of so much that they believe about themselves. A remarkable debut novel, and thank goodness the author has chosen to write romance!

When I was twenty-two I fell in love with an academic in his forties, so this felt very close (a bit too close) to me.

Thank you so much Anna Maria Volkova, and Orion Publishing Group for the ARC. Opinions are my own.