I’m Jessica Stanley, an Australian novelist living in London.
I grew up in Melbourne, studied in Canberra, and worked in journalism, on the set of the TV show Neighbours, for the trade union movement, and in advertising.
Since moving to the UK in 2011, I have been working as a freelance copywriter. My Australian first novel A Great Hope was published in 2022.
My new novel Consider Yourself Kissed will be published internationally in Spring/Summer 2025.
I live in East London with my husband and our three children.
Consider Yourself Kissed (2025)
In the opening pages of my new novel, a man and a woman swap homes for the night and explore each other’s bookshelves. Adam has political diaries and politicians’ memoirs called things like A Journey and My Life, Our Times. Coralie is rebuilding a lifetime’s library of green-spine Viragos after her mother took hers to the dump. They fall in love with each other’s books and almost immediately with each other.
Consider Yourself Kissed is a literary love story set in contemporary East London. It follows Coralie and Adam for a decade of their shared lives, as they build a home and beloved family. All this is set against the backdrop of a turbulent decade in UK politics: Tory austerity, Brexit, Covid, and (throughout, and perhaps worst of all) Boris Johnson. But still, by the end of her thirties, Coralie has almost everything she’s ever wanted. So why is she falling apart?
My inspirational foundation texts include The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst, American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld, The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford, and the Cazalet chronicles – all pull you through the pages, make you laugh and cry, and (despite the darkness of their eras) leave you feeling comforted and known. That’s why I read and love fiction, and why I wrote this book.
Consider Yourself Kissed will be published in 2025.
Early praise.
‘Consider Yourself Kissed is a smart literary love story and an absorbing family drama. Jessica Stanley follows her characters over the years as they make their way in the private, intricate, fragile world they create for themselves, and in the always-changing larger world. This is a deeply appealing and winning novel.’ Meg Wolitzer
‘Fabulous . . . It’s clever, joyful, familiar and awkward, and so funny.’ Nina Stibbe
‘Sweet and tender’. Pandora Sykes
‘Consider me smitten’. Chris Power
‘I loved it, I loved them, I loved the Cazaletty interior details, I loved the social politics, I loved the actual politics, I loved the time span, I loved how complicated everyone was. I already know I will read it again . . . A beautiful romcom for grown-ups.’ Ella Risbridger
‘A book about falling in love to fall in love with - Consider Yourself Kissed is a beautifully observed, charming, intelligent, very funny novel full of heart and warmth and life. Jessica Stanley is a rare and special talent.’ Lisa Owens
‘Immersive, truly funny, brilliantly smart, and full of lovable characters, Consider Yourself Kissed is a joy. In her novel spanning ten years of one woman’s life, Jessica Stanley balances domesticity and politics, contemporary British history and the pursuit of love – and she makes it all seem effortless. I cried when I read the last page, simply because I was bereft that it was over.’ Claire Dederer
‘I absolutely raced through this novel which I found so smart, funny and true to life. One of those books you’ll want to give all your friends once you’ve finished.’ Claire Powell
‘Oh how I loved and empathised with Coralie! Consider Yourself Kissed is funny, tender, authentic and incredibly moving.’ Jennie Godfrey
‘I feel as though Consider Yourself Kissed is the book you want to be reading whenever you imagine yourself sitting down with a novel! The platonic ideal of reading experiences! . . . So funny, so smart and deliciously well observed! A real treat.’ Lizzy Stewart
‘Set over ten years, this wonderful, sweeping novel doesn’t just make the political personal, but the personal political. It shows us how life is a series of negotiations and situations over which you have little control, but that loving and being loved is central. Beautiful and life affirming.’ Araminta Hall
‘Beautifully written, wise, funny, moving. Deftly fuses the personal and the political. A proper grown-up love story.’ Beth Morrey
‘A beautiful, harrowing, wild ride through everyday life, Consider Yourself Kissed is a love song to women everywhere.’ – Annabel Monaghan
‘So astonishingly clever, but with a core of love’. Daisy Buchanan
Pre-order ❣️
Consider Yourself Kissed will be published in Australia by Text Publishing (April 2025), the UK by Hutchinson Heinemann (May 2025), the US by Riverhead (June 2025), Canada by Doubleday, in Germany by DuMont, Romania by Editura TREI, and more.
A Great Hope (2022).
In 2022, my Australian debut novel was published by Picador AU. Set in inner-city Melbourne, A Great Hope is about a family (and love, and politics).
It was called ‘acutely observed’, and a ‘taut examination of a well-off family under great pressure’ in the Sydney Morning Herald; ‘fascinating and insightful’ in the Herald Sun; and ‘thrilling’, ‘ambitious’ and ‘never boring’ in Australian Book Review.
A Great Hope was longlisted for Mark & Evette Moran Nib Literary Award 2022, and shortlisted for the MUD Literary Prize 2023, and is available for sale in Australia.
Elsewhere.
READ.LOOK.THINK. is my long-running email newsletter for writers and readers. Sent out every three or four weeks, each edition contains links to essays, books, first person writing, recipes, podcasts, interiors and more. Explore the archive and subscribe on Substack.
On Instagram @dailydoseofjess, I share what I’m reading, what I’m working on, and my life in Hackney with my husband and three children. I also have a TikTok! It’s just little snippets and scenes from around Hackney: @consideryourselfkissed. Bluesky is an experiment! Let’s see how it goes! @jessicastanley.co.uk.
My favourite book of all time is Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty, and — before I quit Twitter — my fan account @lollinghurst was featured in The New Yorker.
Contact.
To contact me directly, please use the form to the right (desktop) or below (mobile).
Literary agent: Lizzy Kremer, David Higham Associates.
Film/TV agent: Nicky Lund, David Higham Associates.
Author photograph: Sophie Davidson.