Liquid: A Love Story is a satirical romantic comedy novel by Mariam Rahmani. It is her first novel, published by Algonquin Books. Rahmani also narrates the audiobook.
Liquid focuses on an unnamed narrator, an Iranian-American adjunct professor living in modern-day Los Angeles. A few years after earning her doctorate, the narrator decides to set herself a goal one summer: obtain a rich fiancé (gender unimportant) by the end of the season. With three months to accomplish this, she decides to approach the task in a more quantifiable way than ever before: go on 100 dates and track the data in a spreadsheet, noting each person’s name, profession, and other important descriptors. But all of this gets pushed to the back burner when her father, who lives in Tehran, has a heart attack, forcing her to travel to Iran for a family medical emergency.
There are four characters of importance in the general plot — three of them are queer, and two are bi. The first is the unnamed narrator, who is smart, funny, witty, and observant, both in her romantic quest and in her observations of Los Angeles and its various communities. She is bi and has no problem talking about dating both men and women or expressing her attraction to them. She also makes no room for even casual biphobia, whether directed at her or others. Adam, her best friend from college, is a finance guy/poet, and the two slowly realize, in classic idiot-plot fashion, that they are in love with each other over the course of the novel. Adam sometimes struggles to accept other people’s queerness but never questions the narrator’s. He often supports her, freely uses the term “bi” to describe her, and good-naturedly jokes about her queer quest.
The narrator’s other main love interest is Leily, a sapphic potter whom she dates while in Tehran. Although her relationship with Leily serves as an emotional escape for the narrator amid her anticipatory grief, it is no less valid. Their relationship is explored further as the narrator considers uprooting her life and moving to Tehran. Finally, there’s Julia, Adam’s on-again, off-again girlfriend, a contemporary artist who cheats on Adam with men and women alike — even flirting with and kissing the narrator at one point during a coked-up frenzy (and whom the narrator is likely secretly and begrudgingly attracted to).
In an interview with The Common, Rahmani discussed how the narrator’s fluid sexuality challenges traditional gender roles and romantic expectations. Although the narrator seeks financial security through marriage, she often applies conventional heterosexual relationship dynamics to her queer relationships. Rahmani explained how financial pressures influence these roles, while the narrator’s experiences in Iran challenge her assumptions about masculinity, femininity, and love.
Liquid: A Love Story proved a major success for Rahmani, earning rave reviews from publications such as The Atlantic and numerous picks for Book of the Month clubs.
Liquid follows a witty academic who approaches dating strategically, hoping to find love or financial security. The novel critiques modern romantic comedies, explores how identity and social expectations shape relationships, and examines queer dating in Los Angeles. At its center is a flawed but relatable bi Muslim woman of color whose experiences challenge traditional romance narratives. For these reasons, we consider it a cerebral but modern queer classic and a strong example of bi representation in modern romantic literature.