The Simp: The hilarious and tragic debut novel about one man’s quest to land the role of a lifetime

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PICKED FOR ROXANE GAY’S AUDACIOUS BOOK CLUB’If you’re already missing HACKS, this will fill the void’Debutiful, ‘The Most Anticipated Debut Books of 2026”I was hooked right away and excited to turn the page’ – NetGalley Review, ? ? ? ? ? ‘In some ways, this is a satire about Hollywood elites and how they live in a weird world . . . But mostly it felt like the desperation to achieve our dreams’ – NetGalley Review, ? ? ? ? ? ‘Sharp, unsettling, and surprisingly tender . . . We follow Raj Ladlani, a gay Indian American actor whose big dreams have quietly curdled’- NetGalley Review, ? ? ? ? ? Raj Ladlani is one of thousands in LA: an unemployable actor. He has reasons to believe he is spectacularly talented (his beloved acting coach Anthony says so), a legend in every way but for the success. His anonymous life working at Yogurtland, obsessively reading Vanity Fair, and fantasizing about stardom, comes to an end when he answers a job ad detailing a relentless, laughable parade of menial responsibilities for a ‘Hollywood Family’. So begins the astonishing decline and fall of Raj Ladlani. The Simp tells the story of Raj’s momentous employment and the destruction that follows in the wake of his time with the with the H Family: Jim, a macho director determined to prove himself as an artist; and Anna, his much younger wife who has ambitions of her own. And when the job reveals itself to be an absurdist walk through affluent domestic chaos and misguided engagements with identity politics, Raj might be about to lose it – on a very public stage. ‘Funny, poignant, and positively delightful’Graham Moore, author of The Holdout’A searing, hilarious farce’Nikesh Shukla, author of The Boxer