The thing about short story collections—and I’m pretty sure I’ve said this before—is that the experience of reading one is similar to buying a new cd was in the 90s. There was at least one track you knew that had compelled you to buy the album (in this case “Cat Person” is the story equivalent of that track. After you experienced the whole, you’d find some tracks that were amazing, som that were okay, and usually several that you could skip forever. Kristen Roupenian’s You Know You Want This is no exception. Some stories—“Biter,” for example, really stood out as impressive, while others, like the much acclaimed “Cat Person,” actually, were less stellar.
Let’s talk about “Cat Person.” It’s basically out a college girl who dates a guy that she doesn’t really like, then does kind of like, then doesn’t like again. She is incredibly dishonest about her feelings and has horribly ugly thoughts about his age, body, etcetera and then, after he does nothing wrong and treats her pretty well, she ghosts him. Then, in the end, he is turned into a “nice guy syndrome” type who lashed out when he’s rejected. Let me say this: huge feminist over here, so I’m not trying to justify his abusive, slut shaming texts at the end of the story (at this point I’m not protecting against spoilers as this story was totally viral last year), but she is pretty awful to him. She just disappears when he hasn’t done anything wrong instead of talking to him about her feelings. It’s hard to root for this shallow girl. At the same time, you can’t conpletely rule out “Cat Person” because even though the tone towards overweight people is pretty gross, the voice is authentic and the interaction at the end—a guy online suddenly lashing out after facing rejection—is incredibly relatable.
It’s kind of a shame because Roupenian handles the idea of the “nice guy” beautifully in other stories: “The Good Guy,” which tells the story of a classic nice guy who demeans women horribly while convinced he’s actually the ideal kind of guy, reads as so authentic it was almost painful. As a reader, watching Ted become more and more mysoginistic while still protesting that he was a decent, authentic man provided a lot of insight into the dangers of our toxically masculine culture. Poor Ted.
“Biter,” too, stood out as a really great story. It was the shortest in the collection, but despite its short length, it really packed a punched. The story of mild mannered and forgettable Ellie, “Biter” was a perfect display of the way people crave. I’m not going to lie, I was really rooting for her to give in to her desires far before she did.
All in all, this was a really great collection. Again, there were a few weak stories—I didn’t like “The Night Runner” at all—but I received my copy last night and have already finished it. The fact that I couldn’t stop feasting, binging, gorging on these stories says all that needs to be said.
3.5-4/5: Read This.
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