Loveless also opened my eyes to realise how much we expect romance and sex to play a part in the content we consume, despite how unnecessary it is. Whether it’s an unnecessary subplot or the entire story arc, there is always romance. Picking up Loveless – or really any of Alice Oseman’s novels – has been a beautiful break from all the expected romantic tropes that are in just about every novel.

Expanding my social circle and by extension, the books I was reading really helped me to gain knowledge in these areas. There was no awareness or education about ace-aro or other sexualities and I wasn’t that socially aware enough to even be searching for them. In high school, I had never even heard of the words aromantic or asexual, and when I did, I had completely no fucking idea what they meant! The only sexualities I was aware of were straight, gay or lesbian. This novel dragged my arse all the way back to my final year at high school and forced me to reflect on my experience and what I knew about sexuality then compared to now. When I say that I relate to some thoughts or feeling Georgia has, it’s because I thought boys were gross until I was 18 (aka I was a sheltered child). I do not identify as asexual or aromantic. Is she destined to remain loveless? Or has she been looking for the wrong thing all along? With new terms thrown at her – asexual, aromantic – Georgia is more uncertain about her feelings than ever. Georgia has never been in love, never kissed anyone, never even had a crush – but as a fanfic-obsessed romantic she’s sure she’ll find her person one day.Īs she starts university with her best friends, Pip and Jason, in a whole new town far from home, Georgia’s ready to find romance, and with her outgoing roommate on her side and a place in the Shakespeare Society, her ‘teenage dream’ is in sight.īut when her romance plan wreaks havoc amongst her friends, Georgia ends up in her own comedy of errors, and she starts to question why love seems so easy for other people but not for her.

No boys, no girls, not a single person I had ever met. I’ve never read a book about an aro-ace character and I have been so conditioned to expect a romance in just about every novel I pick up, it’s refreshing to know that this one will have a different focus. I’ve been following Alice Oseman on Instagram and Twitter for years and as soon as I heard about Loveless, especially that it centres around an aro-ace protagonist, I knew I had to pick it up.

Loveless characters alice oseman