The relationship between a novelist and a critic is not generally improved by the critic saying what she thinks of the novel. Ríoghnach Robinson has decided to test that proposition by making the two fall in love.
Bad Words, her first novel for adults, follows Selina Chan, a formidable book reviewer, and Parker Navarro, a writer whose debut she once dismissed. Her verdict has done him professional harm; he has hardly forgotten it. By the time his second book approaches publication, the pair are ready to quarrel again, this time at a party where other people can see them.
The confrontation escapes the room and becomes a spectacle online. The two acquire the dubious distinction of being recognizable to strangers who have opinions about their private motives. As publicity for Parker’s novel, this might be useful, except that neither principal appears to possess much control over the situation.
Robinson knows the absurdity of professional literary combat. Writers spend years alone with their pages, and reviewers may pass judgment in the time it takes to finish an assignment. A bad review can feel to its subject like a personal betrayal even when the critic has done precisely what her job requires. The novel exploits that asymmetry, making Selina and Parker disagree not only about a book but about honesty and obligation.
The action takes place in New York’s publishing world, a setting well suited to the collision of private feelings and public performance. Literary parties are meant to be civilized occasions. They can also operate as small markets in status, rumor and prospective advantage. Robinson gives her characters a particularly contemporary difficulty: when an argument circulates online, the audience may acquire a stake in keeping it alive.
That setup sounds like comedy, and the novel has the structure of an enemies-to-lovers romance. But the quarrel is not incidental decoration. The question of whether Selina can change her mind about Parker without compromising her professional judgment, or whether he can forgive her without seeking vindication, is built into the book’s romantic machinery.
Robinson previously wrote young-adult fiction under the name Riley Redgate. The publisher has positioned Bad Words as a crossover between romantic entertainment and an account of artistic insecurity. Its selection for Good Morning America’s October book club will bring it readers well beyond the usual audience for publishing satire.
Few actual book critics are likely to recognize a viral feud of this kind as a welcome professional opportunity. For the rest of us, the novel offers a pleasant, awkward thought: perhaps the person who reads you most unsparingly is also the person paying the closest attention.
Book details: Ríoghnach Robinson, Bad Words · St. Martin’s Press · October 6, 2026 · 400 pages · Hardcover ISBN 9781250431295. Publisher and publication information.
