The Unknowns

by Gabriel Roth

Imagine David Nicholls's One Day as retold by Woody Allen and you'll get a pretty good idea of what to expect with Gabriel Roth's The Unknowns. It's not easy to pursue the most alluring woman in North America when you're a misfiring circuit of over-analytical self-doubt and she has a way with a killer line and a perfectly raised eyebrow. Even, that is, when you've survived your teen years as an outcast in the school computer room to become a dot com millionaire. But as Eric Muller refines his email technique, his date patter, and his ability to shut up after sex, he finds there's more to Maya Marcom than meets the eye. Will our hero be driven to uncover the whole truth about his lover -- or will they continue in bliss and wonder? Welcome to the hilarious, neurotic, and peculiarly perceptive world of The Unknowns.

• ISBN10: 1447235568
• ISBN13: 9781447235569
• Publish Date: 6 June 2013 (first published 1 January 2013)
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 11 November 2014
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Pan Macmillan
• Imprint: Picador
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 240
• Language: English

Reviews

[Michael @ Knowledge Lost]

Eric survived high school in the mid 80’s; the nerd that spent way too much time with computers and never really having any friends. Now he has millions from selling his dot com and lives in a beautiful apartment and living the life everyone dreams of. Except he never quite found love, that was until the glamorous Maya came into his life. It’s not easy trying to get the most alluring woman in the world to pay any attention to you at all.

When I was in high school I really wanted to be a writer, this is the type of story I tried to write. Not as well as Gabriel Roth, I don’t know how to be a writer. they always ended up too short and descriptive, I never knew how to write long form and tended to rush to the end. Don’t get me wrong, The Unknowns is not a typical nerdy love story; Roth showed me just what can be done with this type of novel.

If you think this is not the type of novel I would normally pick up and enjoy then let me tell you why I picked this book up. I consider Megan Abbott the queen of contempory noir and when she blurbs and tweets about a novel, I tend to pay attention. The Unknowns starts out as a nerd falling in love but then deals with the complexity of a relationship, in a slight noirish manner.

Maya may be the most beautiful woman Eric has ever seen but she comes with her own issues she has to deal with. Humans can be fragile creatures and sometimes it is hard to know just how deep the pain runs. When Eric learns about his lover and her emotional scars he is left wondering about the truth. Life is more complex than computer code.

I really enjoyed the way this book tackled relationships; from the start you have a geeky romance and then by the end you are reading about the complex human beings. Roth blends wit with a unique view of the world and human interactions and nails home a magnificent exploration into relationships. I like the way this book is a budding romance/coming of age novel but you look a little deeper and there is so much more to discover.

While Eric isn’t too similar to me, I remember life as an outsider (I still feel that way) and the feeling of trying to navigate the social waters. As you get older, it doesn’t get any easier and you are bound to make mistakes. I’m lucky to have found my own Maya and had to learn about relationships and trying to understand all the pain from their past can be a lot to deal with when you are socially awkward. I really identified with this novel and felt inspired to write again but then I realise I can’t write anything like this and never end up trying.

The Unknowns is a witty humorous contemporary novel full of so many human truths, when Megan Abbott tweeted me to tell me that this novel won’t disappoint she wasn’t lying. I’m not trying to name drop, Abbott is fantastic on Twitter and will happily answer any questions you might have and proves Twitter is the place to be. If you are socially awkward or are interested in the exploration of relationships then this book is for you.

This review originally appeared on my blog; http://literary-exploration.com/2013/09/02/book-review-the-unknowns/