really interesting take on the complexities of knowingly being a mistress and falling in love with that married man. Hera is a fun but frustrating character to follow, a fantastic debut from Gray.

First published in Australia in 2023; published by Henry Holt and Co. on February 27, 2024

The green dot in the title of this novel is the indicator on Instagram that your lover is online. The dot is “staring at you like an eye you can’t see yourself reflected in” and is thus less satisfying than your lover’s actual eyes.

In its early pages, Green Dot is very funny. The humor slowly transitions to drama that is foreshadowed by the narrator’s warning that her audience will ask how she could have been such a fool.

Hera Stephen lives in Sydney. She has no STEM ability but she’s bright, so she views her options as lawyer, journalist, or academic. She loves to learn but has no passion for working. School has taught her that she should be concerned about her formation and development, but spending her days working in a job seems to have little relationship to those goals.

Hera buys her freedom by taking out student loans and earning degrees. The strategy works until she has earned all the degrees that lenders will fund. Hera is living with her father and needs to find work so she can make loan payments.

At the age of 24, Hera finds a position as an online community moderator. The job allows Madeleine Gray to poke fun at internet trolls, content moderation, and office work. While content moderators are rigidly separated from the journalists in her office, Hera finds that a content moderator can get invited to office drinks after work with the journalists by being “young, smart-mouthed, female, reasonably big-titted, with no avowed journalist aspirations of your own.”

Hera befriends fellow content moderator Mei Ling, who is her ally against a universally disliked supervisor. Their snarky message exchanges using the office intranet add to the novel’s humor. Hera also has friends from her student days. Soph, the most amusing of them, “is smart and mostly motivated by vendettas.” She likes to gossip and is encouraging Hera to try having sex with a man (Hera having mostly confined her sex life to women).

When Hera starts to flirt with Arthur, a British journalist who works in her office, Soph encourages her to shag him. Hera accepts the challenge and begins an affair. This is the point at which the story moves from humor to drama. I was disappointed that the humor nearly disappears at that point because the humor is sharp and more enjoyable than Hera’s love life.

The domestic drama of Hera’s affair runs a predictable course. Hera tells the reader at an early point that her story would be predictable and at the end says, “You were right. You predicted it. Everyone was right but me.” Notwithstanding the absence of surprise, the story is emotionally affecting, as Arthur makes promises about leaving his wife but repeatedly explains why the time isn’t right (his wife’s pregnancy is one such excuse). Hera ends it and moves to England, continues to interact with Arthur via Instagram, moves back to Sydney during COVID, and suffers mightily as the story moves to its inevitable end.

Hera’s fantasies about becoming Arthur’s wife and raising his baby as a stepmom might make the reader question Hera’s intelligence, but she is clearly a bright woman who simply has no control over her feelings — or, more importantly, over her response to her feelings. I often feel frustrated with stories about characters who allow their lives to become soap opera plots, but the novel’s initial humor drew me into Hera’s personality and made me sympathize with her when her life falls apart. In the end, Hera manages to learn something about herself and about life — she develops as a person, as she was told she should do in school — and that development suggests a possibility of growth that makes the predictable story worthwhile.

RECOMMENDED

Actual Rating 1.5

I wanted to love this one, as I do really like snarky protagonists and stories about finding yourself. That being said, I didn’t like this protagonist or her voice. She wasn’t written to be unlikeable, but there was nothing about her to like. She also specifically states that finding out she was sleeping with a married man didn’t bother her and then proceeds to carry on with the affair. The book was also heavily made up of exposition/monologues of her inner thoughts and it wasn’t interesting, insightful, funny, or anything much more than boring.

None of the remaining characters were strong either. Arthur especially (the love interest) was bland and flat. As this book is much more character-driven than plot driven and I couldn’t get on board with the protagonist, there wasn’t much I enjoyed about this one. The writing certainly tried to be witty, and there were a few times when it was, but most of the time it felt a bit like it was trying too hard to be clever. There were also a lot of pop culture references which some folks may enjoy but isn’t something I prefer in my fiction.

I recently read another book somewhat like this, and it was a five-star read for me. This one just fell short in too many aspects to work for me. If you’re interested in affairs and bisexual protagonists in their mid-twenties, then you may like this one. My thanks to NetGalley and Henry Holy & Company for allowing me to read this work. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

Book Review! Green Dot

Rating:⭐⭐⭐⭐

Genre:
Fiction, Contemporary, Romance

Read if you like:
Problematic main characters
Being absolutely delulu
Work place drama
Being in your 20s and figuring it out

Synopsis:
At 24, Hera is a clump of unmet potential. To her, the future is nothing but an exhausting thought exercise, one depressing hypothetical after another. She’s sharp in more ways than one, adrift in her own smug malaise, until her new job moderating the comments section of an online news outlet—a role even more mind-numbing than it sounds—introduces her to Arthur, a middle-aged journalist. Though she's preferred women to men for years now, she soon finds herself falling into an all-consuming affair with him. She is coming apart with want and loving every second of it! Well, except for the tiny hiccup of Arthur’s wife—and that said wife has no idea Hera exists.

Review:
A fun and witty book that feels like catching up with a problematic and morally questionable friend. I enjoyed this book. I went in completely blind and knew nothing about it, except I liked the cover and it kind of took place in a work place. Oh boy, I was surprised when the crazy started crazy-ing. Hera is so delulu I wanted to shake her and be like "he is not the love of your life! He is literally just a guy! Hit him with your car!" Hera is the messiest protagonist and I am here for it. Yes Girl! Keep making bad choices!

Hera, a bored 25 year old, enters the work force and at her job she meets the man of her dreams! But shocker! He's married! Instead of cutting her losses Hera has to go all "I can fix him" because of course he's gonna leave his wife because he said he would *insert eye roll emoji here* I loved that the writer chose to go the semi cliche direction with the affair. The writing is so heartfelt, while being hilarious and sad at the same time. A beautiful funny and sad book that will make you want to scream at a wall. Definitely check it out!

Thank you to Netgalley and Henry Holt & Company for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

I wish this was as about a little more than just an affair. It seemed as though it was going to have more, so it was a little disappointing. I loved all the pop culture references throughout. But overall I loved this book and loved the writing.

I pretty much exclusively read unwell woman fiction and Herra is one of the most unwell women I've encountered, The writing is so compelling and I just tore through this. Really enjoyed and would highly recommend!

Thank you to the publisher for an ARC via NetGalley!

Hera is struggling with adulthood but she finds a job as a social media moderator for a news outlet. While working there she starts to become friends with Arthur, an older, married, co-worker. This friendship evolves into a relationship. Hera finally sees herself as an adult and can picture a life with Arthur. She is content at first but soon wants more and Arthur continually promises it to her. Hera is repeatedly disappointed. She makes some big moves to breakaway from Arthur but they are drawn back to each other over and over.
This was a very interesting read. It was a little bit like watching a car accident where you don’t want to look but you can’t look away. I felt this understanding of Hera and the emotions she was feeling but also felt this heartbreak for her because you know what the outcome of the relationship is going to be. The writing really brought out the emotion of the story and I could feel it right along with the characters. There were times where I was so frustrated with their actions but I could still understand them; the angst, the desire, the hope, the longing, etc. This is definitely a different type of book than I have read recently but I really enjoyed it.

She is delulu but I was enraptured until the very last page. We KNEW this wouldn't end well - and of course so did she. Did we look away from the car crash at any point? Of course not.

Madeleine Gray did a great job of capturing the varying phases of friendship, the messiness that is post-grad life, and the way we're all just hoping to belong to someone at the end of the day.

What a ride!! I agree with the author's blurb. "Hera is a clump of unmet potential." She was absolutely someone I would want to smack upside the head with some sense. It was a bit frustrating at times and slow to read about her love affair with a married man, and you already knew the outcome so I had to push myself to finish. Overall, for a debut novel...the author's writing style is really great and I would read their future work based on that statement. This is not a favorite, but it was good.

3.5 / 5 stars

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Dark, funny, albeit frustrating at times because the protagonist in a relationship that won't give her what she needs but really well-done coming-of-age story.

I received a free copy of Green Dot from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

From the blurb:
“At twenty-four, Hera is a clump of unmet potential. To her, the future is nothing but an exhausting thought exercise, one depressing hypothetical after another. She’s sharp in more ways than one, adrift in her own smug malaise, until her new job moderating the comments section of an online news outlet—a role even more mind-numbing than it sounds—introduces her to Arthur, a middle-aged journalist. Though she's preferred women to men for years now, she soon finds herself falling into an all-consuming affair with him. She is coming apart with want and loving every second of it! Well, except for the tiny hiccup that Arthur has a wife—and that she has no idea Hera exists.”

What a delightful book! A very enjoyable read. Though my twenties are long gone, Hera reminded me of the challenges I too met all those years ago. Her affair with Arthur reminded me of some of the relationship missteps I made before I met my husband. I thoroughly enjoyed this books. Highly recommended.

A captivating exploration of obsessive love. It is a witty and thought provoking story that plunges into the complexities of human emotion, identity, and autonomy. The writing is energetic and captures the chemistry between Arthur and Hera. The story is thought provoking.
Many thanks to Henry Holt & Company and to Netgalley for providing me with a galley in exchange for my honest opinion.

Such a fantastic read! I loved the humor—it’s so rare to find a book this funny, and it balanced out the heavier topics and emotions very well. Even though I could see where the book was going, I was so invested in every twist and turn that I couldn’t put it down. One of the best reading experiences I’ve had in a while – I’ve continued thinking about it long after I’ve finished, and have now listened to many podcast interviews with the author as well because I couldn’t get enough.

In the summary it says how it’s a 24 year old who is a mess of on reached potential in by the end of this book not to spoil it for anyone but she doesn’t reach that potential she is a selfish self-absorbed 24-year-old who only thinks of herself and how things affect her I didn’t like her I finish this book a few weeks ago and kept trying to think of a way I could write the review with more creative statements then I didn’t like the book but sadly I cannot I did not like the book. Please forgive any mistakes I am blind and dictate my review I want to think the publisher and NetGalley for my free arc copy.

Another millennial malaise banger.

What this book does really, really well: Hera’s narration is pleasantly stream-of-consciousness, and so it’s very fun (and then, later, heartbreaking) to read. It feels extremely authentic, too; oftentimes books that are trying to write this kind of story, one where there are a lot of asides about pop culture and current events, come across as cringey, like the author isn’t entirely sure what they’re doing. In Green Dot, though, you can really tell Madeleine Gray has a finger on the pulse, so to speak. Hera is also—as a result of the authenticity of the writing, I think—an extremely relatable character. Not all the time, but enough that I felt seen by the book more often than I didn’t. Always a plus! So is the fact that it never overstays its welcome; it’s exactly as long as it should be, with a nice, quick pace that goes down easily.

What it doesn’t: honestly, not much. The only “flaw” it really has, at least in my eyes, is that it very much is what it stays it is. If you like slice-of-life stories about depressed, queer, twenty-somethings fumbling their way through the world, you’ll like this book, end of story. It’s very much for fans of books like Ripe, or My Year of Rest and Relaxation. Given how polarizing that particular niche can be, though, I’d steer clear if it’s not your thing! This book is amazing at what it’s doing, but I don’t think it’ll make someone love a genre or style that they usually can’t stand.

So, 4.5 stars/5, rounded up because it deserves it!

thank you NetGalley and Henry Holt for the eArc!

it goes kinda exactly how you expect it to but because it is so well written i didn’t mind that!

At first glance, this book seems hard-pushed to differentiate itself from all other stories of an affair. The young, naive protagonist spends far too much time begging her lover to leave his wife and then seems baffled when she inevitably ends up on her own.

While Green Dot does follow this premise, the writing is what made this book a five-star read for me.

I found myself relating to Hera, despite the fact that I have never had an affair nor have I ever worked as a comment moderator. Hera’s thought process is inherently flawed and she continuously falls victim to her own delusion, but for some reason, I found myself rooting for her. I attribute this to Gray’s writing. The language and style that she used were beyond sensational for me. She writes exactly the words that I want to read.

At the end of the day, Hera is lost in her twenties and I think we all relate to that in our own way.

The only downside to this book is the inclusion of the pandemic. I’m aware that you should write what you know, but since I lived it, I don’t feel like reading about it right now. This is personal preference and it didn’t damage the rest of the book in my eyes so it’s still a five-star read.

I’ll be "adrift in my own smug malaise" while I wait for Madeleine Gray to write my next favourite read ;)

I think this is closer to a 4.5 instead of a full five, but the more time that goes by since I finished this, the more I love this book. I saw a review on Goodreads that said "She is delulu but aren't we all?" and I think that really sums up the book. I always enjoy stories where we really just spend a bulk of the time in the MC's head in an almost stream of consciousness narrative structure as the MC navigates everyday problems (many of which created by the MC herself). This book really felt like I was listening to a friend make absolutely ridiculous life choices but you just lover her anyway.

Gray is a fresh and exciting author whose debut has a lot of truly relatable and endearing specifics. I found her MC to be appropriately flawed and at times annoying, but in a way that I appreciated were character choices and authentic. I would absolutely read more from her and am excited to have gotten an early look at this new talent.

I am OBSESSED with this book. Thank you to @henryholtbooks for the ARC—from the Taylor Swift epigraph to the wrap-around cover, I loved GREEN DOT. Gray’s voice is so unique; she really captures the verbal cadences of millennial women and the way in which technology saturates contemporary relationships. Not since Drake’s Hotline Bling has a millennial dramatized with such emotion the transference that happens between our generation and our phones. Due to the crucial role the latter play in our affairs of the heart, the phone itself becomes a kind of love object.

The Taylor Swift epigraph was 100% perfect. My only gripe was that I wish it was the only epigraph to the novel. I get what the Ginsburg is going for but the Taylor Swift is such a genius move here that it deserved to stand alone.

GREEN DOT perfectly depicts the type of relationship one has in their early-to-mid-twenties; Hera has so many anxieties about adult life and she pours herself into her doomed relationship with Arthur in order to avoid confronting how she will make meaning in her life. It’s SUCH a stage and Gray shows it perfectly—Hera decides that if she can lose herself in Arthur, she will be happy, but he is ever out of reach. And, of course, that is why he has been selected for Hera’s “blank space”; he is appealing because he makes concrete the relationship that Hera already has to fulfillment, purpose, and happiness: inconsistent and fleeting. I adored how, at the end of the novel, Gray turns Arthur into the green dot in a different way—he becomes merely a blip in Hera’s past, once she realizes that she has been using his unattainability as a distraction from bigger, more interesting questions about her life trajectory.

Overall, I highly recommend GREEN DOT. Readers who love millennial fiction will enjoy it immensely.