The Overthinkers

‘I laughed. I cried. Sometimes at the same time!’
—Tim Ferguson

‘Portolan and Cheong’s voices stitch seamlessly together to lay out a funny, honest and extremely relatable story, so clearly born of the 2020s. I couldn’t get enough of it!’
—Marlee Silva

Four twenty-something-year-olds doing their best to navigate their lives, loves and dreams in fast-paced and status-obsessed Sydney. Trying to appear ordinary on the outside but inside obsessing on the unspoken rules of what’s okay and racked with self-doubt.

Leo: the confident ‘Gay-sian’—fit, fabulous and hilarious but riddled by anxieties and seeing an unavailable married man.

Benji: a privileged pretty-boy who spends his time pining after Leo’s gorgeous house-mate Francesca, who barely notices that he’s alive.

Francesca: a social climber plotting her remarkable and glamorous future, aligning herself to well-connected but lost Hamish.

Hamish: an eastern-suburbs private school boy dealing drugs to distinguish himself, and now he’s met a girl he really likes (who is not Francesca).

When Leo discovers his married man has been ‘grinding’ on the side, Benji and Francesca sleep together, Hamish gets close to his new dream girl and their already chaotic lives spin into hyper-gear as things get even more complicated.

Who will they be on the other side? Will they be friends, enemies or strangers?

Fast-paced and brilliant, The Overthinkers is the debut novel of writing team Lisa Portolan and Ben Cheong.

Out 9 August from Big Sky Publishing—distributed by Simon & Schuster

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