Single, Desperate, Ugly: A Novel

From the internationally bestselling author of Sarong Party Girls—a brilliant and darkly satirical novel that explores what happens when Big Brother enters the bedroom.

As the leader of a new emergency task force at Singapore’s Social Development Unit, or SDU, it’s Viv Ong’s job to counter the threat of the country’s plummeting birth rates, and she needs solutions fast. At the height of her desperation, she takes on a new role in her country’s already sprawling bureaucracy: Matchmaker-in-Chief.

Viv’s idea—a modern-day boot camp for patriotic singles—looks excellent on paper. Ignoring the taunts from colleagues that SDU can also stand for 'single, desperate, ugly,' Viv is confident that with rigorous planning and stringent coupling formulas, her boot camp will produce the next great generation. Obviously, only those from the most elite backgrounds need apply. Her plan backfires spectacularly, however, when the less-than-elite Addison Quek shows up, subverting all expectations and upending Viv’s vision of what life should be.

Against the backdrop of round-the clock surveillance and mounting coercion to procreate or get erased, Viv and Addison find themselves chasing connection while navigating family and societal pressures. But it just may be that the one thing that can't be engineered or controlled is the messy human heart.