If you clicked on this review, I’m going to make three assumptions about you: you love Melanie Saward (she may even have taught you during your degree), you are looking for a romcom with Aboriginal and/or queer representation, or you’re ‘just a girl’ with a slightly delulu dream. If any of these are correct, I can confidently tell you that by the end of your reading time today, Love Unleashed by Bigambul and Wakka Wakka author, Melanie Saward, will be added to your TBR.
Published through Penguin Books, Love Unleashed follows Bigambul woman, Brynn Wallace, who has recently graduated from her master’s and is aspiring to work in editing. She takes to New York, confident in landing an editing internship with The Paris Review – a stepping stone to making it big in publishing and living her dream life. However, unsurprisingly to any creative industries graduate who has opened LinkedIn searching for a job that isn’t an unpaid internship or listed under the title “Talent Star!”, her lavish plans don’t exactly work out.
Brynn has the not-so-subtle awakening that she won’t be picking up books from the slush pile, but instead dog poo at her doggy day care job, and living in an overpriced cramped apartment… But also having the best sex of her life. We take wins where we can, don’t we? This book is filled with a series of colourful events that all contribute to Brynn’s phenomenal character growth. Just when you think the author is giving her a break, a new complication tumbles its way into the end of a chapter. It’s one of those books guaranteed to make you change your 6am alarm to 6:05am so you can enjoy those extra minutes of sleep before your 9am class the next day – because you will be staying up past your bedtime devouring it.
Love Unleashed explores relevant, yet underrepresented themes. The ones that stayed with me were healing from abusive relationships, fatphobia, friendship breakups, Blak joy, and bi-love. The refined portrayals of these themes were fresh, particularly Brynn’s trauma responses from an emotionally abusive relationship with ex, Scott. A sombre moment occurs in chapter 16, when Brynn accepts a dog-sitting job. Little does she know that it was previously done by her coworker, Hilde, who gets upset that Brynn “took” her job and gives her the cold shoulder. Even though she did nothing wrong, her response is to apologise and offer to cancel the job because she feels bad, which left me frantically writing “Don’t apologise! It’s not your fault Brynn!” in the page’s margin. This, and other moments of the protagonist healing from what she endured, are very touching.
Saward cleverly wraps serious themes together with classic romcom tropes, such as friends to lovers and multiple love interests, to make them easy to swallow. Altogether, they make this book become much more than your everyday commercial fiction. Reading this made me consider whether placing these topics into the romance genre was a stylistic choice. After Anita Heiss – author of Tiddas, Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray and Manhattan Dreaming, among other publications – Saward is only the second Aboriginal woman to have released a romantic comedy. When I saw Saward speak at the Lubly Stories panel with Heiss at the recent Brisbane Writers Festival, the author said that this doesn’t make her proud but disheartened that she is only the second. In this discussion, Heiss stated that dissecting marginalised topics through literary fiction as opposed to commercial fiction is a privilege. This is because literary fiction reaches such a niche reader base. This statement kept ringing in my head while reading Love Unleashed. It explores important topics that desperately need to be discussed, yet are typically silenced in the Australian literary space.
Thus, this book feels like a literary fiction wrapped snuggly into a romcom. Saward’s rapport with the reader acknowledges its typical “cheesy” romcom tropes, almost feeling like she is breaking the fourth wall. One of my favourite quotes encompasses just this: “With the fallcoloured park behind, it occurs to me that up to now this has been a New York moment to remember. But instead of being the deeply romantic scene from a romcom, it feels more like the part where you realise that things are not going the ways you’ve planned.”
The unremorseful portrayal of the struggles of navigating your 20s was a big breath of fresh air for me. The meticulous portrayal of Gen Z and Millennial characters makes other media representations feel shoddy and unrealistic in comparison. It felt as though I was having a conversation with a person my own age, despite Saward being older than me. I cannot recommend this book enough for emerging creatives – especially those aspiring to work in the writing or publishing field. While fiction, I couldn’t stop myself from questioning whether Saward had stolen my journal to base this book off, because of how closely it represented my internal struggles trying to make a name for myself in the creative industry. Saying this, this book is loosely drawn from the author’s time in New York.
It’s also commendable how it addresses the increasing importance of a social media presence for writers’ career growth, a subject frequently neglected in many creative writing courses. Love Unleashed beautifully describes the interconnection of technology and the traditional publishing industry through each chapter, beginning with a short texting conversation between Brynn and her friends or family. This serves as a comforting repetition symbolic of how the publishing and writing world has changed due to the increase of information and entertainment being transmitted through social media. Another instance is Brynn starting a TikTok account to promote her work in the hopes of helping her find a publishing job. This poses the question of how creatives can navigate this awkward period, where a strong social media presence is almost a prerequisite for getting published yet remains a relatively quiet topic in literary discussions.
I cannot finish this review without touching on the atmosphere and aesthetic this novel creates. While very Gen Z/Millennial in tone, the use of imagery feels quite nostalgic, reminiscent of shows like Gilmore Girls or Friends. It made me feel as though I could make a Pinterest board tailored to Brynn’s experience in New York and trying to find her “New York moment”.
Overall, Love Unleashed by Melanie Saward offers an exciting new perspective. With exploration of underrepresented topics and a taste of nostalgia, I’m confident this is the book that the Australian literary space desperately needed.
Madeleine Litchfield is a Meanjin-based creative, set to graduate with a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Creative Writing) from QUT at the end of 2024. Alongside her studies, she works in digital marketing and freelances as a writer. Her work has been featured in publications including ScratchThat Magazine, Frocket Zine, Glass, Semper Floreat, Your Pals and Pressenza. You can read her poetry zine, girlhood & hot beverages, on her website. For more of Madeleine’s creations, visit her Instagram @madeleinelitchfield.
