Sheena Patel’s debut novel opens with the unnamed protagonist tracking the online life of a female influencer who has recently scored a six-figure book deal and “who is sleeping with the same man as I am”. Our thirtysomething narrator is the daughter of immigrants, works in the arts and lives in south London with her boyfriend, whom she blithely admits to treating atrociously. The other man she is seeing is a highly respected artist who is married and has multiple women on the side, including the influencer with whom she is unhealthily obsessed.
I’m a Fan is written in brisk and bracingly candid chapters that read like prose poetry and lend themselves well to audio. Patel is the narrator, who reads much as she writes: bluntly, dispassionately, permanently on the outside looking in. As the only woman of colour moving in white, wealthy circles, the book’s protagonist is disaffected, insecure and keenly aware of how her skin colour and lack of money put her at a disadvantage. The affluent people whose lives she covets are “the beneficiaries of the old, covert systems, descendants of the children of settlers and the children of Empire, left-leaning spawn of right-leaning families”. Knowing all this, she nonetheless craves their proximity and approval. By putting her married lover on a pedestal, she is, in his eyes, merely a fan.
Clear-eyed and disturbing, this short, sharp book provides a brutal depiction of status anxiety, toxic social media and what happens when white privilege tips into abuse. I’m a Fan is by no means a comfortable listen, but it’s compulsive and gripping nonetheless.
• I’m a Fan by Sheena Patel is available via Granta, 4hr 31min
Further listening
One Boy, Two Bills and a Fry Up
Wes Streeting, Hodder & Stoughton, 8 hr 57min
The MP for Ilford North narrates his poignant memoir looking back on his childhood living on the breadline in a Stepney council estate.
A Heart Full of Headstones
Ian Rankin, Orion, 11 hr 42min
DI John Rebus finds himself in the dock and facing a life sentence in the latest from the Scottish crime writer. James MacPherson narrates.
