Acts of Service
Ratings13
Average rating3.7
15
Ratings13
Average rating3.7
A “bold and unflinchingly sexy” (Vogue) debut novel about a young woman who follows her desires into a world of pleasure, decadence, and privilege, unraveling everything she thought she knew about sex . . . and herself. “One of the most entertaining books about sex I’ve ever read . . . The perfect read for fans of Raven Leilani and Ottessa Moshfegh, this is a book that will have people talking.”—BuzzFeed “A sex masterpiece.”—The Guardian ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New Yorker, The Hollywood Reporter “Anytime I want, I can forsake this dinner party and jump into real life.”—Eve Babitz Eve has an adoring girlfriend, an impulsive streak, and a secret fear that she’s wasting her brief youth with just one person. So one evening she posts some nudes online. This is how Eve meets Olivia, and through Olivia the charismatic Nathan. Despite her better instincts, the three soon begin a relationship—one that disturbs Eve as much as it enthralls her. As each act of their complicated, three-way affair unfolds across a cold and glittering New York, Eve is forced to confront the questions that most consume her: What do we bring to sex? What does it reveal of ourselves, and one another? And how do we reconcile what we want with what we think we should want? In the way only great fiction can, Acts of Service takes between its teeth the contradictions written all over our ideas of sex and sexuality. At once juicy and intellectually challenging, sacred and profane, Lillian Fishman’s riveting debut is bold, unabashed, and required reading of the most pleasurable sort.
Reviews with the most likes.
no one in this book has a discernible human emotion at any moment, and i think there's a built in structure where if you think this book sucks it's because you're judging the characters for their absolute batshit behavior, which in most cases i would say is true. but here it's just absolutely unrecognizable action and reaction, stuck between meandering purple prose paragraphs where not one of the philosophical ideas about submission and desire sticks the landing. these are not serious people. the only moment of reality comes when fatima starts asking eve what the fuck her dumb rich white ass is doing defending this absolute manipulative monster of a man simply because she likes being dicked down and degraded by him. i cannot in any way recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading because it might turn you against all literature. also the last line being like “he was the greatest act of service i had ever received” REALLY? we're gonna end the book with the title? GROW UP!
This one hurt, but it kept me hooked the whole way through
