Disappoint Me

Reviews / Votes

A riveting tale of finding lasting companionship. Despite the title, it's unlikely to disappoint. * Observer * Disappoint Me is a refreshingly unsentimental and moving exploration of millennial ennui, prickly friendships and toxic masculinity. It eschews essentialism by depicting modern relationships and the flow of power and secrecy with astuteness and compassion, cementing Dinan as one of the UK's most perceptive young novelists with her finger firmly on the pulse of contemporary behaviour. * Guardian * Nicola Dinan's observations are so razor-sharp that you're sure you've met her characters: the self-important East London poet, the over-friendly girl in the bathroom queue, the gap-year student convinced he's worldly after two weeks on a silent retreat in India. For this reason, every description and bit of dialogue is delicious to read, and if she nailed it in her debut novel Bellies, she's mastered it in Disappoint Me. The book follows a blossoming relationship between twentysomethings Max and Vincent in present-day London, peppered with flashbacks to Vincent's first relationship with a trans woman in his teenage years. It is pacy, perfectly pitched and emotionally honest: I loved every page. * Stylist, 'Best Books of 2025' * A story of millennial fears and forgiveness, reckoning with past mistakes, stylishly interweaving two compelling voices as they unravel their own love story. Disappoint Me follows Dinan's debut novel, Bellies, which is another example of deeply empathetic writing and elastic endings that stay with you long after. * Vogue, 'Best Books of 2025' * As the title indicates, it explores the fundamental point that building a sustainable love for someone involves them disappointing you: eventually, the dreams and expectations that we attach to a person will be somewhat compromised. I think the novel explores that so amazingly. * Shon Faye, Guardian * Disappoint Me is anything but a disappointing follow-up in its smart exploration of heteronormativity and the weight of expectation. * Dazed, 'The 12 Most Anticipated Novels of 2025' * Sharply insightful, warm and heartbreaking. * Cosmopolitan, 'Best Books of 2025' * The author of the award-winning Bellies returns with another insightful dissection of millennial life ... tackling tricky friendships and toxic masculinity. * Harper's Bazaar * A riveting, hilarious and totally devastating love story... This exploration of millennial angst, race, and trans panic will have you gripped and sets Dinan as a literary voice to watch. * Elle, 'Best Books of 2025' * A very modern love story and Dinan is very much the woman to write it. * GQ, 'Best Books of 2025' * In the follow-up to her award-winning and critically acclaimed first novel Bellies, Dinan examines the pain and growth that disillusionment brings... Dinan writes so intelligently about regret, remorse and hope - and still manages to nail humour, too. * AnOther, 'Best Books of 2025' * Nicola Dinan is able to bring an incisive wit to the big questions of modern relationships: namely, how do we know when to trust another person with our heart and how do we show our love to one another. Disappoint Me is a study in human frailty that is riveting, funny and devastating. It explores heteronormativity, friendship and getting older but, most of all, it's about confronting the disturbing fact that we cannot ever fully know the person we are sleeping next to. It's rare I read a book in one sitting but I was carried along by these compelling characters. * Shon Faye * Nicola Dinan writes like some kind of demigod, her fictions make thinkable new realities for how we live, what we might expect from each other. * Torrey Peters, author of Detransition, Baby * Disappoint Me is an absolute gift. Bursting with big questions about the politics of romance, family, and care, this novel navigates moral and emotional complexity with grace, nuance, and real storytelling nerve. Dinan is a savvy observer of contemporary culture; she writes with wisdom, style and brilliant comic instincts. I loved it. * Oisin McKenna, author of Evenings and Weekends * Nicola Dinan's second book confirms to me that she is one of our most exciting writers. Delving into how we fall in and out of love, Dinan knows how to write directly to the flaws we show when in love, with biting wit and laugh out loud humour. Yet the characters linger with you after you have finished. Disappoint Me is an addictive read, that I really did not want to end. * Travis Alabanza, author of None of the Above * Dinan has such a deep understanding of people and why they do what they do, how they arrive where they are, she brings the world to us so completely, all the pain, love, joy and mess of it, I feel completely winded by the wholeness of it. Her writing is so beautiful, so affecting it left a lump in my throat. * Annie Lord, author of Notes on Heartbreak * Disappoint Me is a wonder of a novel, hilarious and heartrending in equal measure: one that marries the prickly, delicious pleasures of its keen observational comedy with the riskiest ventures into the unavoidable messiness of true human intimacy. Dinan has created a work of profound heart and clarity, with a vision of fear, love, growth and repair that will give you hope for the future, and with lines so unforgettably funny and true you'll be sending them to your group chat immediately. * Elaine Castillo, author of America Is Not the Heart * Reading Nicola Dinan's writing feels like reading the inner workings of your mind on a page. So perceptive and honest about failure and love, and how inextricably linked they are. Disappoint Me is clear evidence of the skill and talent of a writer who does not know how to disappoint, whose prose is vivid, emotive, powerful and funny, and whose ability to make us feel only grows stronger with every story she tells. * Ore Agbaje-Williams, author of The Three of US * Exciting to see this young novelist's second book already! Couldn't put it down! I enjoy reading about the millennials & also find them quite mysterious. I appreciate Dinan's take on timeless questions about the relationship between setting & character. She's quickly become one of those writers where I'll just always be reading her new book. * Andrea Lawler, author of Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl * Disappoint Me is a mature and assured novel. Its two intersecting stories show that the spaces people hold for each other are always in transition, and I admired Nicola Dinan's work in elaborating the growing pains of a trans experience muddled by race, class and changing public attitudes. * Mendez, author of Rainbow Milk * Disappoint Me is a brilliant and funny love story-the kind that shows us who we are, who we're scared we might be, and what it really takes to trust another person. Immersive, perceptive, and layered with nuanced truths about friendship, family, queerness, and real romantic partnership. I didn't want this novel to end. * Jules Ohman, author of Body Grammar * I adored it. A delicious story of change, and a beautiful meditation on human connection. Dinan is a stunning chef of words and this is a book for greedy readers. I melted into every page like butter and didn't want it to end. * Jodie Harsh * Brimming with razor sharp wit and compassion, Disappoint Me is a charming, big-hearted love story unlike any I've read before. It's an insightful and brilliant meditation on the existential anxiety of otherness, the intermingling of pride and shame, and forgiveness. Dinan forces us to ask ourselves: are we more than the worst thing we've ever done? How do we reckon with our pasts so that we can forge a future? Disappoint Me is an absolute knockout. * Marisa Crane, author of A Sharp Endless Need * Dinan's prose is heartfelt and endlessly readable. She explores her characters with sympathy and patience, never casting villains, only complicated humans who are trying their best. * Reader's Digest * Nicola Dinan will be studied in years to come as one of the modern greats... The kind of writing you'll be talking about for weeks after you've finished reading. * nb Magazine * Exploring themes of identity, ageing and forgiveness, this novel is original, addictive and thought-provoking. * Diva * Confident and captivating in her writing ... Dinan is certainly one to watch. * PA Media * A poignant treat of a read. * heat * A poignant read. * Closer * A fresh take on tangled relationships and millennial ennui . . . Dinan unpicks the complications of both [characters'] pasts with delicacy and care. * Marie Claire * Dinan is a sharp, observant writer, and Disappoint Me presents big questions about forgiveness, justice and responsibility, about whether people can change after they have done bad things to others, and what sorts of misdeeds we might be willing to accept in our friends, family members and lovers . . . The abundance of compassion that Dinan has for her characters, and that they have for each other, is laudable. * Xtra Magazine * All readers will recognize the characters' struggles to both acknowledge youthful mistakes and decide whether or not to forgive them in oneself or in others. Dinan's second novel is dramatic in scope but is often quietly introspective. * Bookreporter * Delivers devastating one-liners, a perfect social read of the queer-literary scene, and a second-act twist. * W Magazine * Nicola Dinan's first novel, the Lambda finalist Bellies, was a gorgeous tale of platonic entanglement and first love. In Disappoint Me, Dinan builds on her astute portraits of romance to tell the story of Max, a trans woman in her 30s fed up with the way her life has turned out. * Vulture *