Literature / Boyfriend Material

WANTED: One (fake) boyfriend. Practically perfect in every way^note Luc (top right) and Oliver (bottom left)

Luc: I increasingly think some people are meant to be lonely. I'm lonely because I'm a wreck and nobody wants me. He's lonely because he's awful and nobody wants him.
Bridget: See. You do have something in common.

Boyfriend Material is the first book of a trilogy of Queer Romance novels written by Alexis Hall called London Calling.

Boyfriend Material, the first of the three novels was published in 2020. The Sequel, Husband Material, came out in 2022, and a third novel, Father Material, is planned for 2024.

The first novel involves a Fake Relationship plotline between Luc O'Donnell, the son of two former rock stars, and Oliver Blackwood, a lawyer who Luc knows through his friend Bridget. Following a photograph that looks a lot worse than it was, Luc needs this relationship to save his image, which will in turn save his job. Oliver, meanwhile, needs someone to take to his parents' anniversary. It's a mutually beneficial arrangement, even if they don't like each other all that much.

...But when is fake dating ever that simple?

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Boyfriend Material provides examples of:

• Abilene Paradox: Luc and Oliver's marriage. Luc got flustered and emotional and proposed to Oliver without thinking; after which he decided to go through with it, since Oliver had immediately informed his family and he had bought a ring for him. Even as doubts keep piling up for him, Luc can't back down because Oliver is putting his all into the wedding and he believes that this is what Oliver wants and that it is going through with it or losing him. Oliver meanwhile, reveals at the very end that he also had serious doubts about the marriage and the process made him realize this is something he doesn't really want in his life, but can't back down either because he thinks Luc must have had to gather all his courage and willpower to propose, and terminating their engagement would mean to break his heart. Oliver blinks first at the final chapter of the novel, revealing he can't go through with it to Luc right before their wedding, prompting a fight in which Luc also mentions he didn't want to get married. They decide to simply call off the wedding and keep dating.
• Abusive Parents: Oliver has a hard time accepting that his parents are guilty of emotional abuse - claiming they just like to push their children to be the best they can be. At their anniversary, Oliver's parents (and uncle) systematically tear down everything from his career to his weight. The fact that he's The Un-Favourite also puts a strain on his relationship with his brother. Cristopher, on the other hand, is so showered with the praise of his parents he is constantly trying to live up to their expectations of him and can't bring himself to be honest with them when their plans for him doesn't match his, like the fact he doesn't want children.
• Age-Gap Romance: Priya is dating a woman considerably older than herself, though their relationship seems completely functional and happy.
• Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: Luc's mom is an eccentric and overdramatic woman that immediately talks about her ex-husband's penis size in front of her son's new boyfriend. That said, their quippy relationship is still loving, and they're the healthiest parent-child relationship among the main couples.
• Amicable Exes: Subverted with Tom and Luc, who dated before Tom decided to go out with Bridget. The two hang out due to proximity, being in the same circle, but aren't close to each other, and sometimes, Luc still has resentments about their relationship or shame about his behavior during it. When the two are alone at the beginning of the novel, it's extremely awkward for Luc.
• Bittersweet Ending: Very much on the sweet side in the first book. Luc and Oliver end up in a relationship after all the trouble they've been through, and both are in a better place than they were in the beginning of the novel. That said, Luc's father walks out on him again once it turns out he doesn't have cancer and Oliver's relationship with his parents is still strained.
• Break-Up/Make-Up Scenario: In the first book, Luc and Oliver break up their Fake Relationship at least three times before ending up together.
• Career Resurrection: In-Universe. Luc's father, Jon Flemming, has been going through one recently. He cleaned up his act and started showing up in reality TV, especially as a judge in a The Voice-esque show. This only causes further problems to Luc who now has to be the "out of control" son of a recovered addict in the eyes of the public.

• Character Development: When the story starts, Luc is cynic, depressed, closed off, and has pretty much given up on having a romantic life. His relationship with Oliver helps him get a lot of self-respect back, a more positive outlook in life, and gets a lot of his personal life back on track. Oliver, on the other hand, gets a little bit of it due to happening much later on the first book, but he is on a better place than before, having decided to accept to be in a relationship with Luc, even as he is terrified of being as vulnerable as Luc makes him feel and is willing to recognize the ways his parents are being manipulative and a drain on his emotions.
• Crusading Lawyer: Oliver is a barrister and passionate about the right to a fair defense - at one point he mentions that his job is to stop one mistake ruining a person's life. He also mentions that the job doesn't pay too well (at his level), although he does assume that he makes more than Luc.
• Deadpan Snarker: Deconstructed. Luc is constantly snarking and cracking jokes at the expense of others, especially his fake boyfriend, but this hardly makes him more endearing to the people around him, to whom he just comes off as mean, especially when he accidentally starts needling people or using subjects they are sensitive about, which ends with him just being rude and he later feels bad for being snarky, however, he can't turn it off because it's a defense mechanism.
• Demoted to Extra: Luc's father. After their fallout in the first book, where he was a recurring subplot, he only appears twice on the second, both over a phone call with Luc, making for short scenes that are only vaguely connected to the conflict central to when they happen.
• Empathic Environment: In the novel's final chapter. As Luc and Oliver reconcile and both feel optimistic about the future of their relationship, they watch the sun rise, signifying the hopeful tone of the novel's ending.

• Fag Hag: Bridget, the only straight girl in Luc's group of queer friends. Downplayed in that she seems to actually only have two gay friends despite hanging out with groups of gay people: Luc and Oliver.
• First-Person Smartass: Luc, the narrator, who, at one point when he can't be sarcastic, comments that his build-up of unused sarcasm may be fatal.
• Foil: Oliver and Luc, at first, seem very different in all aspects: personality, disposition, interests, goals, and they even lampshade how different their relationship histories are despite both being messes (Oliver has had too many relationships, all of which end with people breaking up with him, and Luc has had too few out of fear of opening up to anyone). It's only later, after some considerable Character Development, Luc acknowledges they're actually very similar in at least some ways: they're both equally messed up, just messed up in opposite ways: where as Luc tried to stop caring and relegate himself to a lonely life, Oliver skips from one relationship to the next, trying way too hard to be perfect rather than be really open to his partners, and both of these come from a place of fear of vulnerability and openness to others.
• Foreshadowing: Both times Luc and Oliver go on a dinner date, Oliver refuses to order desert, but eats half of the desert that Luc orders. In the end, it's shown how much he represses his desire to eat because of his family's pestering him about his weight.
• Forgiven, but Not Forgotten: Downplayed. When Luc meets Miles, the man who ruined his life, again, he accepts to attend his wedding with a young youtuber, as an olive branch. While attending the wedding, he makes a few amends with some people he used to hang out with before their break up also tore apart their shared friend group and gets to see a bit of Miles's side of the story (he did feel guilty about his actions and all of their closest friends sided with Luc, cutting him out of their lives). When he parts with Miles, he seems to have buried the hatchet, but very clearly states that they're not, nor will ever be, friends, and he will always be the man that ruined him for years.
• Grand Romantic Gesture: Invoked. Bridget is a big fan of those and pushes Luc to do these in order to get Oliver back when they have a fight. This culminates on her roping their whole friend group into an impromptu road trip to try to find Oliver and get him back to London, only to realize Oliver did not go through with the moving and job interview, and therefore the trip was for naught.
• Hate Sink: Luc's father, Jon, is a neglectful parent that was never there for his son or his wife during their lifetime, preferring to live the hedonistic life of a rock star, and letting paparazzi run wild rumors on his son. He comes back to his life swearing that he wants to reconnect and regrets his behavior, but walks right out again when he turns out to not have cancer. In the second book, he is still as unreliable and narcissistic, having lied about being a cancer survivor despite never having cancer, even wanting to use his son's wedding as a publicity stunt to appear like an ally to the public.
• Hard Truth Aesop: Different people have different relationships. The traditional path of relationships leading to marriage are not for everyone and is not a proof that a relationship is healthier or more stable than an alternative one. Luc and Oliver end the second book happier not married than they would be if they married, realizing that the institution of marriage is not something either of them enjoys.
• I Want Grandkids: Oliver's parents really want grandkids and because Oliver is gay, they seem to focus even more of their attention in his straight brother to produce offspring. Because Christopher does not want kids, but can't bring himself to disappoint his parents with that information, he is constantly uncertain of what to do.
• Internalized Categorism: In the second book, a topic of fights between Luc and Oliver ends up being about Oliver discomfort with typical LGBT spaces and iconography, which to Luc is a safe haven. This culminates into Luc accusing Oliver of having some form of internalized homophobia. Oliver eventually concedes that he will never be able to fully determine why he doesn't feel totally comfortable with a kind of space meant to include him, and whether that comes from his personal tastes, his discomfort with the commercialization of said iconography, or being raised by parents who saw that as negative, but that he will most likely just continue to dislike it, and Luc learns to be at peace with that and that is simply not Oliver's scene or aesthetic.
• Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: Luc's father seemed to be on the way to recovery, having tried to make contact with Luc and create some sort of bond with him as he realizes he may have cancer. When he turns out to not have cancer though, he just straight up vanishes and stands Luc up, prompting Luc to realize his father really is just an asshole.
• Lethal Chef: Luc's mother is an atrocious cook and her "famous curry" actually makes Luc feels bad about eating. The second book shows that Lucien is probably just as bad as her.
• Malicious Slander: Luc's tabloid persona reflects in nothing on who he really is. According to tabloids, he is always out in alcohol, drugs and sex-filled benders and getting caught afterwards. The accident that starts the whole thing ends up comes from a greatly blown out of proportion story: Luc gets out of a costume party with rabbit ears he got in a sex shop (the only costume he could afford and find, though he otherwise wore normal clothes), trips and falls in the gutter; the story that is spread about it is that he passed out in a gutter on fetish gear after a over-indulging on sex and alcohol.
• Market-Based Title: In Brazil, the title of the novels significantly differ, but that is because the terms "Boyfriend Material" and "Husband Material" really don't have a direct translation.
  • "Boyfriend Material" becomes "Procura-se Um Namorado" (liberally, "Boyfriend Wanted", more literally, "Looking For A Boyfriend")
  • "Husband Material" becomes "Esse É Pra Casar" (liberally, "This One is a Keeper", more literally, "This One is to Marry")
• One-Steve Limit: A subversion Played for Laughs. James Royce-Royce refers to two characters: a couple of Opposites Attract with the exact same name. And in the sequel, it is also the name of their baby.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Luc's full name is Lucien - only Oliver calls him that.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: During his parents' anniversary, Oliver is unquiet, he can't sleep much, his perfectionist tendencies are turned to the max, he's unusually rude to some people while unusually meek around others, showing how much his family has been bad for his mental health.
• Opposites Attract: James Royce-Royce and James Royce-Royce. One is an outgoing, Camp Gay chef, the other is a shy, threatening-looking mathematician.
• Parents as People: During David's wake, Oliver makes an impromptu speech, during which he seems to fully acknowledge his father was a very complicated man. That, despite his genuine love for his children, and that he always provided and cared for Oliver, he was judgmental, homophobic, hypocritical, and unwilling to question his own beliefs or back down when wrong. Oliver makes it clear that he is sorry his father died and misses him, but that he does not regret their last fight where he stood his ground against him.
• Parting-Words Regret: Subverted in the second book. Oliver doesn't regret that his final words to his father were "go fuck yourself", he sees their conflict as something that was a long time coming, from a lifetime of his father's judgmental and homophobic treatment of him and all of his partners, including Luc, who is his fiancé by that time. His regret much more comes from the fact that he hadn't done it sooner or that his father didn't live long enough for them to be able to work out said conflicts. In his eulogy, he says that he wonders whether a few more months would have his father admitting he had it coming.
• The Perfectionist: Oliver's Fatal Flaw. Oliver tries to live up to impossibly high standards, morally and physically, mostly pushed by his parent's constant criticisms of his life and appearance.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Luc gives one to Oliver in an oddly romantic way: he points out the many ways that Oliver is just as fucked-up as him, pointing out he is controlling, prissy, people-pleaser to the point of self-destruction, patronizing, smug, surprisingly needy, and maybe has an eating disorder; and more importantly, Luc loves him warts and all.
• Romantic Fake–Real Turn: Luc and Oliver start off pretending to be boyfriends, admit their feelings during book one and are officially in a real relationship by the end.
• Runaway Bride: Played With. At the end of the second book, neither of the protagonists actually wants to marry each other, which they only realize ten minutes before the wedding actually happening. Once that is cleared up, they're back together, announce that they will not go through with the wedding, though they'll still have a party, and happily walk out of the venue hand in hand.
• Secretly Selfish:
  • Jojo, Miles's fiancé. Jojo insists on inviting Luc to their wedding as an apology for what Miles did to Jojo, but right after the wedding, he admits to Luc that the real reason he wanted him there was as a sort of consolation. Miles did something awful to Luc by selling his secrets to a tabloid, the revelation of which almost causes Jojo to break up with him. Jojo wanted to see Luc to know that if Miles did the same to him, there was someone who made it out of the same situation and is living a happy life after Miles's betrayal.
  • Oliver has this opinion of his brother. Despite his philanthropic work as a doctor in in-need zones of the world, he believes that part of this job that Christopher sees as an advantage is how it puts him thousands of miles away from his family all the time, leaving Oliver to deal with any problem his family has. For example, when their father dies, Oliver is left to do everything, including setting up the ceremonies and consoling his grieving mother, while Christopher only appeared at the day of the funeral, once his help was no longer needed.
• Sex, Drugs, and Rock & Roll: Jon Flemming lived in that lifestyle for years and his reputation of an out of control rockstar contributed to the cooling of his career and the undue attention to his son of the media. He now lives as a recovered and remade image.
• Shipper on Deck: Bridget had spent ages trying to get Luc and Oliver together. Luc disregarded it because he thinks this is just his Fag Hag friend trying to get her only two gay actual friends together. She's elated even by their fake relationship and tries to push it into an actual one.
• Shout-Out: The plot of the second book involves Luc and Oliver attending Four Weddings and a Funeral in total (Bridget/Tom, Miles/Jojo, Alex/Miffy, their own, and Oliver's father's funeral).
• Sibling Rivalry: Oliver and his brother have a cold and antagonistic relationship, largely born out of their parents playing favorites with them. Their favor towards Christopher makes Oliver resents him for always being the golden child in their eyes and have his accomplishments diminished in order to play up Christopher's. Christopher on the other hand, responds to the animosity in kind, also suffering from the crippling pressure his parents put on him. In the second book, they start amending their relationship, once they come to terms that their parents were tough on both of them, as Christopher was also constantly belittled by how inattentive to his parents he was compared to Oliver.
• Straight Gay:
  • Discussed, one of the major conflicts of the story, donors for Luc's charity pulling out after a Malicious Slander tabloid about him after a party, is connected to this trope. Luc's donors lean conservative in such a way that they are ok with Luc being gay, but as long as he fits into a certain description of an "acceptable, non-threatening homosexual". One of the major reasons why Oliver is the one he choses is because he fits perfectly within that description, which he and his friends describe as being very "heteronormative".
    Luc: They've got to that place where they've realized being homophobic is bad, but haven't quite reconciled that with the fact they're a bit suspicious of gay people.
  • This is brought up again for discussion in the sequel, where this aspect really drives a wedge between them, because Luc realizes that Oliver is inherently drawn to traditional settings and aesthetics that are very heteronormative and that makes him uncomfortable, whereas Luc's tastes for the kind of openly queer, gender-defying, artsy scene that makes him feel comfortable and celebrated are uncomfortable to Oliver who feels judged in these spaces. This makes for a recurring topic of argument between them. The novel ends with Oliver somewhere in the middle, realizing that while he doesn't feel represented by the overtly LGBT culture, he also doesn't feel represented by traditionalist structures either, and ultimately agrees with Luc that he also doesn't want to get married.
• Sugar-and-Ice Personality: Oliver is austere but this hides an insecure, sweet centre.
• Time Skip: There is a two year skip between the first and second book. Within the second book itself, there is a two month time skip between the third and fourth segment of the book.
• Running Gag: Bridget is always dealing with an over the top and bizarre work-related incident, complaining she might get fired over this one.
• The Un-Favourite: Oliver's parents do not see him as successful when compared to his brother, Christopher. Even when talking about Oliver, they end up talking about how his brother has surpassed him in one way or another and this puts a strain on the brother's relationship to each other. The fact that his parents are quite homophobic, despite their vicious aversion at being called ut for it, probably contributes to this.
• Upper-Class Twit: Luc's colleague Alex Twaddle and Alex's girlfriend, Miffy. They're both rich children of the nobility of the UK, but are far from bright.
• Weight Woe: Oliver is a very fit man and goes above and beyond to keep himself like that, which Luc notices because he always wants desert but never orders it. Takes a darker turn when his weight turns out to be one of the many things his parents constantly needle him about, with an uncle even joking about how it is his weight that makes him lose so many boyfriends. In the end of the first novel, Luc even says he should look for a professional, suspecting Oliver might have some sort of eating disorder. Book two shows him developing a healthier relationship with food and his own body, though he still has moments where he feels uncomfortable being undressed even to Lucien, with the implication that his body isn't as well defined.

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