From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of I’m Glad My Mom Died comes a sad, funny, thrilling novel about sex, consumerism, class, desire, loneliness, the internet, rage, intimacy, power, and the (oftentimes misguided) lengths we’ll go to in order to get what we want.
Love doesn’t always arrive at the right time—or in the right form.
In Half His Age, an unexpected relationship challenges assumptions about age, desire, and what people truly need from one another. What begins as attraction gradually becomes something more emotionally complicated, forcing both characters to confront the realities behind their choices.
Set against the pressures of modern life and social expectations, the story explores the tension between passion and judgment. The age difference between them becomes impossible to ignore—not only because of how others perceive it, but because of the emotional baggage and life experience each person brings into the relationship.
But attraction alone isn’t enough to overcome insecurity, fear, and the question of whether two people at different stages of life can genuinely build something lasting. As feelings deepen, difficult conversations and painful truths begin to surface.
The relationship becomes not just a romance, but a catalyst for self-reflection, vulnerability, and change.
Emotional, intimate, and layered with tension, this novel explores the risks people take when they choose connection over convention.
Because sometimes, the heart refuses to follow the rules society expects it to obey.
About this book
320Pages
7 - 8Hours to read
99kTotal words
Review
“[A] revenge story, one where McCurdy excavates emotions she herself had at seventeen. And if it makes you angry, about feminism or rampant consumerism or the power dynamics in age-gap relationships, even better—McCurdy still is, too.”—Rolling Stone
“Hilarious, gross, disturbing, poignant.”—The Washington Post
“A writer able to capture some of the darkest parts of human nature with unflinching honesty and devastating humor.”—NPR
“A bleak, often hilarious and uncomfortable triumph that underscores McCurdy’s talent for focusing in on the multilayered nature of trauma and artfully unpicking it, one scab at a time.”—The Guardian
“Brimming with teenage angst and McCurdy’s signature dark humor . . . This is far from a romance, and it’s not a glamorization of age gaps—it’s an analysis of consumerism, insecurity, misguided desire, class, and addiction.”—USA Today
“Assured, provocative . . . cements [McCurdy’s] standing as a talented writer . . . articulates the vulnerability of girlhood with guts, humor and just the slightest whisper of warmth.”—The New York Times
“Eerie and unsettling and believable.”—Gillian Flynn
“McCurdy is a fearless and darkly funny writer with an unerring eye for the perfect mortifying detail.”—Tom Perrotta
“Recently, I picked up Jennette McCurdy’s Half His Age. It was like picking up a downed power line, so full of rage and want and, well, electricity, that I couldn’t put it down. In her scorching account of a high school student and her teacher, McCurdy gets at some hard truths about what we want out of relationships, and what we actually get.”—Ann Patchett, Oprah Daily
“[McCurdy] has created a brilliant teenage character who won’t play the victim. . . . You can think of this as a post-MeToo novel in that it is beadily intelligent about the currents of predation without feeling the need to deliver lectures.”—The Times (UK)
“An unflinching, uncomfortable tale of power dynamics and disaffected youth . . . McCurdy’s voice is all her own: clear-eyed realism coupled with emotional honesty.”—The Independent
“Bold and brash . . . A vivid picture of all that we dismiss when it comes to the complexity of a young woman’s desire. . . . With each of her books, McCurdy continues to lean into the uncomfortable conversations that end up leading the discourse.”—Harper’s Bazaar
“With her electric debut novel, Jennette McCurdy has established herself as one of the most exciting literary voices of our time.”—Carley Fortune
About the Author
Jennette McCurdy is the author of I’m Glad My Mom Died, winner of the 2023 American Library Association Alex Award. The book is a #1 New York Times bestseller, spending more than eighty weeks on the list. It has been published in more than thirty countries and has sold more than three million copies. McCurdy is creating, writing, executive producing, directing, and showrunning an Apple TV+ series loosely inspired by I’m Glad My Mom Died, starring Jennifer Aniston. Half His Age is her debut novel.
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