A compulsively readable debut novel about two college students, each with his own troubled past, whose escalating obsession with one another leads to an act of unspeakable violence.

‘An utterly captivating fever dream of a novel.’ Brandon Taylor, author of Real Life

When Paul enters university in early 1970s Pittsburgh, it’s with the hope of moving past the recent death of his father. Sensitive, insecure, and like a stranger to his family, Paul feels isolated and alone. When he meets the worldly Julian in his freshman ethics class, Paul is immediately drawn to his classmate’s effortless charm.

Paul will stop at nothing to prove himself worthy of their friendship. But Julian is as volatile and cruel as he is charismatic, and Paul begins to suspect that he can never live up to what Julian expects of him.

As their friendship spirals into all-consuming intimacy, they each learn the lengths to which the other will go in order to stay together, their obsession ultimately hurtling them toward an act of irrevocable violence. From then on, everything changes…

These Violent Delights is an exquisitely plotted excavation of the depths of human desire and the darkness it can unleash upon us...

'A clever novel of manners.’ New York Times