Bellies: ‘A beautiful love story’ Irish Times

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Although dealing intimately with love, Dinan does not characterise the novel explicitly as a love story. She says: “I suppose it is a love story, but in a lot of ways it’s a subversion… It subverts the tropes of a love story in that Ming’s journey creates this fundamental incompatibility between Tom and Ming. So these two characters are left to negotiate what love actually is. That is the story: two characters negotiating what love can be between two people when other things are in the way.” It’s not actually helpful to the cause to have these perfect characters, because when you create a solely virtuous narrative around a group of people, people look for ways to prove that wrong It’s a condition of society now in that we just grow up a bit later and in a lot of ways the ways our bodies grow outpace our minds. We look like adults but we don't necessarily feel like them. And that's an interesting analogy to transness right? In the sense that people are looking at you and seeing one thing, but your internal experience of what you are feels different. That dissonance can cause a lot of distress in people across the board. It's definitely one of those skills that you have to constantly practise as well. You can really easily fall out of touch of how you like to write, or like why you like to write, if you're not writing all the time. I wanted to capture the turbulence of both transitioning and being in your early twenties. I also wanted to offer the perspective of a character who isn't trans, but instead observes their partner’s transition. It felt like a story I hadn’t seen, and transness has always been an interesting prism through which I view other aspects of life: extraordinary periods of change, how we grow apart from other people, fundamental incompatibilities in relationships. Confident and witty, a charming young playwright, Ming is the perfect antidote to Tom's awkward energy, and their connection is instant. Tom finds himself deeply and desperately drawn into Ming's orbit, and on the cusp of graduation, he's already mapped out their future together.

In this dryly comedic, richly drawn portrait of friends and lovers in early adulthood, Nicola Dinan charts the complexities, contradictions, and joys of human entanglement, and reminds us of the inevitability of being changed by those we love. Bellies is a book that not only explores transformation, but transforms the reader, too. I loved this powerful, mortal, moving debut. Rachel Khong, author of Goodbye, Vitamin

Wiz Wharton

I haven't felt so seen by a book in a long time. Neither have I cried like that at one. Bellies broke me apart in the best way possible. Dinan is a huge talent and I'll read everything she writes. Annie Lord, Vogue columnist and author of Notes on Heartbreak EC: We see Tom and Ming at their best and their worst, and at times I found it genuinely challenging to keep seeing the world through their eyes. What’s your view on the benefits of keeping narrative focus and empathy on characters who are being unlikeable, foolish, or cruel?

Dinan's gift as a writer is her ability to make us feel - when her characters cry, we cry; when they laugh, we laugh; and everybody is changed by the end of this novel, including the reader. A beautiful love story and an exceptional debut. Irish Times

Nicola Dinan's powerful and vulnerable debut Bellies marks a watershed moment in British trans fiction

Reflecting the nuances and realities of real love is what I was trying to achieve in my own novel, and I admire her ability to capture a single moment and make it so electric and alive. She's a very, very talented writer Liv Little, author of Rosewater It’s also hard to conceive of what audience I would’ve written for. Sure, the girls, the gays and the theys, but even that demands a reductive approach to a group with really distinct reading habits. Audiences can also surprise you. I wouldn’t want to limit myself from the get-go. Bellies has done quite well with a lot of boomers. Who knew? ND: I have a Bellies playlist! It was fun to think about what music goes with each chapter – the novel has a very nostalgic feel to it, because it draws on this nostalgic time, being in your early twenties at university and finishing university. It’s also situated in the late 2010s and early 2020, so there’s a specific period it’s drawing on. You’ve got some Shygirl in there, some Hot Chip, a good chunk of Azealia Banks, and there are songs that are specifically referenced in the book like Aphex Twin and Don’t Stop Now by Dua Lipa. And it ends on Ribs by Lorde, of course. Bobby Mostyn-Owen, commissioning editor, acquired UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, to Bellies from Monica MacSwan at Aitken Alexander. A publication date has not yet been set. A brilliantly tender depiction of male friendship at its best, and food descriptions so rich they'll leave you holding the book in one hand and looking up recipes with the other GQ Magazine

Bellies follow the interweaving lives of Tom and Ming as they each struggle with belonging and identity. We watch them through an unbiased lens and come to know them as if they were our friends too. Set firmly in a landscape I know so well, and with central and side characters who are so dynamic, Bellies truly feels like a story I lived through. What’s more telling of an impactful story than when you close the book but the characters live on? I really fell in love with the characters of Ming and Tom. It has heartbreaking parts but ones that make you smile with joy too. I hope we hear more from Nicola Dinan in the future.Nicola Dinan’s debut novel Bellies begins on familiar terrain – a group of college students at the union bar, the beginnings of attraction between two students, Tom and Ming – but as Dinan closely follows their relationship, the book shifts from the kind of generic story you think it’s going to be, to the kind of story that becomes a lasting favourite with unforgettable characters.

Over Zoom, AnOther spoke to Dinan about transition stories, writing Malaysian food, and what’s in her Bellies playlist. ND: Sometimes, to truly empathise with characters, they need to be a bit cruel. They need, at times, to be unfair and unreasonable, because people are unfair and unreasonable. I don’t want people to read Bellies and empathise with Bellies because they think they’re seeing their best selves in the novel. It’s far more interesting to reflect people as they are. I don’t think we learn from characters that are overly virtuous, particularly if they’re minorities like Ming – it just reaffirms the fear that we are not entitled to the same flaws and spectrum of emotions as everyone else, and that is damaging. Everyone in the book is flawed. You have Tom’s best friend Rob, who is a bit of a shit to girls, but at the same time is a really lovely supportive loyal friend. You have Ming’s dad, who genuinely wants what’s best for Ming, but it’s his own vision of what’s best for Ming, not necessarily hers. The vast differences between those two reactions has shown me that the ways that art interacts with the world are so unpredictable, and I don’t want to be prescriptive with what people find in Bellies . More than anything, I’m just excited to see what people can get out of it. Dinan's prose is heartfelt and endlessly readable. She explores her characters with sympathy and patience, never casting villains, only complicated humans who are trying their best. It is an earnest and honest exploration of identity and connection that is sure to resonate. Reader’s Digest '5 Debut Books to Look Out For in 2023'

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Bellies is a sumptuous, powerful novel, about the self, about food, about relationships but ultimately about finding yourself in a complicated world. Nikesh Shukla, author of The Good Immigrant What do I owe you as an author? A duty to not misinform, sure – I think we can agree on that. But what does that leave? As a trans author – in representing characters historically excluded from mainstream literature – what do I have to represent? I am perhaps overly conscious of the ways in which Bellies sounds like a Chat GPT novel for Gen Z or millennial readers. Queer love story? Slay. Trans narrator? Queen. Of colour? Confetti cannons. And yet, I’m also ever conscious that Bellies doesn’t fully represent the trans experience. I can’t help but worry Ming’s not the right trans person to learn from. We were immediately absorbed and transported by the love story between Tom and Ming — and by Nicola’s writing, which is in equal parts hilarious and heart-breaking,” said Element Pictures’ Ed Guiney, Andrew Lowe and Chelsea Morgan Hoffmann, who will executive produce alongside Dinan. “We think the world is hungry for a love story like theirs — that authentically allows for the space and complexity of their changing dynamic, both as Ming transitions but also as the two of them grow into adulthood — while still honoring the excitement and intensity of first love. We are delighted to bring their story to the screen and couldn’t be happier that Nicola is adapting herself.”