Debut author Shailee Thompson’s new novel How to Kill a Guy in Ten Dates follows cinephile Jamie Prescott, who has to rely on her extensive knowledge of what not to do in a slasher situation when a speed-dating event she attends turns deadly.
Jamie Prescott is a cinephile who hopes her extensive knowledge of what not to do in a slasher will help her survive a speed-dating event that turns into a bloodbath.”It’s a killer love story,” Thompson quipped.
“It’s all of those things that you love from a slasher and all of the things that you love from a rom-com.” The novel is called How to Kill a Guy in Ten Dates, a nod to that brilliant rom-com How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days starring Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey. Thompson has never been speed dating herself, but the former high school teacher has plenty of friends who’ve tried it.”I kind of say it is a bit of a joke, but I’ve done parent-teacher interviews as a teacher and you have 10 minutes per parent and there’s about 28 in a night. “And I feel like that’s very similar to speed dating in a way as well, because you have to have those quick conversations and you have to connect with people really quickly.” Thompson did drop in on a speed-dating event in New York, where participants were each given an advance copy of her book.The novel is a genre mash-up, given the main character Jamie is an expert in slashers and rom-coms.”I saw a tweet, of all things, on Instagram, because I’m a millennial and the poster said that there were too many Christmas rom-coms and not enough Halloween rom-coms,” Thompson said. “And I don’t think they meant a slasher rom-com, but it was something that just kind of got stuck in my head.”Thompson used to teach English, literature and drama to students aged 12 to 18.”I think that it was setting a challenge for myself, that these genres shouldn’t go together, but can they?””I grew up in the ’90s and so films and watching DVDs and videos was always a very huge part of my childhood and my teenager years. “And I think I kind of grew up in the golden age of that kind of rom-com that we’re very familiar with.Thompson is a former high school teacher.”I don’t think I’m as much of a cinephile as Jamie — she’s on a completely different level,” she said. “But I’m the kind of person who will throw out quotes and whip out references to movies all the time.” There are quotes at the beginning of each chapter, which may draw in fans of romantic movies such as When Harry Met Sally and P.S. I Love You, but Thompson puts a sinister spin on them. “I found that a lot of rom-com quotes, some of the famous ones, could be used in a horror film anyway,” Thompson said.The novel touches on toxic masculinity and the power of female friendships but Thompson shuns attempts to pit men and women against each other.She considers her book a romance novel despite the clash with horror.”There’s a film from the ’80s called Romancing the Stone and there is a romance novelist in that called Joan Wilder and her publisher calls her a hopeless romantic and she’s like, ‘No, I’m a hopeful romantic.’She says there’s a whole community of people who feel this way.”And all of these subgenres, you know, we’re hopeful romantics.”
Shailee Thompson Shailee Thompson Debut Novel
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