The Simp
On sale
7th July 2026
Price: £20
‘A searing, hilarious farce’
Nikesh Shukla, author of The Boxer
A novel without a hero. A hellscape with an infinity pool.
Raj Ladlani is one of thousands in LA: an unemployable actor. He has reasons to believe he is spectacularly talented (his beloved acting coach Anthony says so), a legend in every way but for the success.
His anonymous life working at Yogurtland, obsessively reading Vanity Fair, and fantasizing about stardom, comes to an end when he answers a job ad detailing a relentless, laughable parade of menial responsibilities for a ‘Hollywood Family’. So begins the astonishing decline and fall of Raj Ladlani.
The Simp tells the story of Raj’s momentous employment and the destruction that follows in the wake of his time with the with the H Family: Jim, a macho director determined to prove himself as an artist; and Anna, his much younger wife who has ambitions of her own.
And when the job reveals itself to be an absurdist walk through affluent domestic chaos and misguided engagements with identity politics, Raj might be about to lose it – on a very public stage.
Nikesh Shukla, author of The Boxer
A novel without a hero. A hellscape with an infinity pool.
Raj Ladlani is one of thousands in LA: an unemployable actor. He has reasons to believe he is spectacularly talented (his beloved acting coach Anthony says so), a legend in every way but for the success.
His anonymous life working at Yogurtland, obsessively reading Vanity Fair, and fantasizing about stardom, comes to an end when he answers a job ad detailing a relentless, laughable parade of menial responsibilities for a ‘Hollywood Family’. So begins the astonishing decline and fall of Raj Ladlani.
The Simp tells the story of Raj’s momentous employment and the destruction that follows in the wake of his time with the with the H Family: Jim, a macho director determined to prove himself as an artist; and Anna, his much younger wife who has ambitions of her own.
And when the job reveals itself to be an absurdist walk through affluent domestic chaos and misguided engagements with identity politics, Raj might be about to lose it – on a very public stage.
Newsletter Signup
By clicking ‘Sign Up,’ I acknowledge that I have read and agree to Hachette Book Group’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Use
Reviews
Engrossing. A Ripleyesque story of envy and self-abasement, cut through by a satire on the hypocrisies and pretensions of Hollywood
A searing, hilarious farce about race, class and power in Hollywood, which acts as an important parable about wealth and ambition and the things we must do to get ahead. Written with a director's eye for detail, an acerbic tone and a big heart, this is a searing satire about the film industry