the Art of Almost Being Chosen: A novel about ambition, silence, and women who mistake potential for love

She built a career from nothing. She crossed oceans. She became the woman everyone admired. And still, she waited. For the call that didn't come. For the man who needed more time. For the moment someone would finally choose her - without conditions, without silence, without testing how long she would stay. From a childhood shaped by quiet adjustment - redrawing numbers on report cards, learning to read silences before she could read rooms - to a life built on ambition, grief, migration, and a marriage that looks right on paper, she carries one pattern she cannot seem to leave behind. She adjusts. She endures. She waits. Until one man tells her the truth she wasn't ready to hear: "I was seeing how many days you would wait." The Art of Almost Being Chosen is a raw, precise novel about the patterns we learn in childhood and carry into every room we walk into as adults. About the difference between being respected and being wanted. About the moment you realise that endurance is not the same as love. "She would not audition for love again." Perfect for readers of Dolly Alderton, Taffy Brodesser-Akner, and Deepa Anappara.