Bellies: ‘A beautiful love story’ Irish Times

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A beautiful book. Thoroughly enjoyed it even if it did make me cry several times (I'm very emotional). The most fantastic consequence of that, however, is all the messages I’ve had from people telling me how seen they felt in the novel, and not just readers from the east and south east Asian community it depicts, but anyone who has struggled to move to a new culture and felt displaced and in limbo. Knowing I’ve written something specific and yet universal is genuinely the highest praise I could have hoped for, especially as growing up I never really saw myself represented in the mainstream fiction space and this was always something I longed for. It’s also hard to conceive of what audience I would’ve written for. Sure, the girls, the gays and the theys, but even that demands a reductive approach to a group with really distinct reading habits. Audiences can also surprise you. I wouldn’t want to limit myself from the get-go. Bellies has done quite well with a lot of boomers. Who knew?

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. It is an earnest and honest exploration of identity and connection that is sure to resonate. Reader’s Digest '5 Debut Books to Look Out For in 2023' Bobby Mostyn-Owen, commissioning editor, acquired UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, to Bellies from Monica MacSwan at Aitken Alexander. A publication date has not yet been set. With a TV adaptation in the works, Nicola Dinan discusses her vivid, intimate début novel, Bellies. In Happy Hour, we meet Isa and Gala, two carefree young women visiting New York for a summer. The friends are broke and get by on the favours of men who buy them free drinks, pay for their cabs and give them gifts. In Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels, Lenu and Lila come of age in a violent postwar Naples, embroiled in fights between communists and fascists, with (unhappy) marriage being one of the only means of escaping poverty.Bellies is the story of Tom and Ming. They are originally a couple until Ming realizes that the anxiety he is feeling is because what he really wants is to transition but where does that leave his and Tom's relationship? EC: The book has two POV characters; it’s quite rare that a book’s empathy and focus is so evenly shared between two characters even though they’re so different. It would have been very easy for the book to devote more empathic resources to one character than the other, but it stays very balanced. A brilliantly tender depiction of male friendship at its best, and food descriptions so rich they'll leave you holding the book in one hand and looking up recipes with the other GQ Magazine As I said, Ghost Girl, Banana was really written in tribute to my mum and so from the start I was very much focussed on doing her story and her experiences justice, albeit through fiction. I think this also helped me write with a sense of nothing to lose, which is the unique gift of a debut author. There was no expectation there and therefore no cynicism to the process!

It’s exciting. Writing can be so private. Having a book in shops makes my career as a novelist feel much more material. The book tour was so rewarding, it was the first time I was able to talk about the book in a way that extended beyond small talk at dinner parties, and it took me as far as Tbilisi. At the same time, I worry a lot. The book is a project close to my heart, but as a result of its release it's transformed into a product. I can’t help but fret over whether people are buying it, reading it, burning it. On a trip to Malaysia, where Ming’s mother died – and “it’s not so hot for the gays”, reports Ming – the couple eat kuih seri muka and yong tau foo. Dinan summons different locations with supple grace. (“Places move into people just as much as people move into places,” she writes.) She is also deft at depicting intimacy. Tom and Ming listen to each other’s bellies gurgle, watch Britney Spears’s snake dance on a laptop and practise Meisner technique, a theatre exercise of closely observing a partner’s actions. Until it isn’t. After a while, Ming starts being distant from Tom and reveals that he is considering transitioning. Suddenly, the novel turns from boy-meets-boy romance to something much more interesting. Traversing the pitfalls of the gender transition novel, Dinan, who herself is trans, deftly weaves a compelling and compassionate narrative that feels totally unique in this year’s literary calendar. The synopsis says: “It begins as your typical boy meets boy. At a drag night in a university town, Tom meets Ming. Ming is what Tom wants and wants to be: a promising young playwright; confident and witty and a perfect antidote to Tom’s awkward energy. They fall hard for each other, but when Ming announces her decision to transition, the pair must confront that love may not be enough. A luminous depiction of what it's like to love someone for their very soul. Nicola is a beautiful, beautiful writer. Ore Agbaje-Williams, author of The Three of UsJury Head Baz Luhrmann on Attending Red Sea Film Fest Amid Regional Conflict: "Voices of Storytellers Need to Get Out There" A beautiful work of literature with fully realized, highly empathic characters; [Dinan's] treatment of Ming's transition is superbly and insightfully handled. An important contribution to the slender body of transgender literature . Booklist, Starred review Moving from London to Kuala Lumpur, New York to Cologne, Bellies follows two queer students, Tom and Ming, who fall in love at university and find their relationship dramatically upended when Ming comes out as trans and decides to transition.