49 pages • 1 hour read
Helen HoangThe Kiss Quotient
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2018A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Importance of Self-Love
Because the novel alternates a third-person close perspective for Stella and Michael, the reader can see how they each respond to the world around them. This includes their growing affections for each other, which they both deem themselves to be unworthy of. The novel’s climax and epilogue reinforce that self-love is just as important as being loved by others.
Stella is an attractive, accomplished woman who excels at her job. In the very first scene, the reader learns that she turned down a promotion because of not wanting to interact with people, an anxiety that stems from her autism. This is representative of Stella’s overarching feelings about her Asperger’s syndrome, which is that it is a negative thing and a constant source of anxiety for her. She hides it from people, including Michael. Quan only learns of her diagnosis because he sees her become overstimulated and asks her. Stella believes that her autism makes her difficult to love, if not unlovable. She dislikes being treated differently because of her autism, seeing accommodations as weakness. When she and Michael have their fight and end their “relationship,” Stella believes it is because of her autism, noting: “She understood at once he meant her, that she wasn’t enough for him. Because of who and what she was, her impairments and eccentricities, her label” (251). This leads her to try to break out of the habits that she connects to autism, revealing the depth of her self-loathing. She violates her own comfort to become “normal” and to counteract her perceived undesirability.
Michael is similarly disbelieving about his own place in a relationship with Stella. Michael is confident in his physical appearance, but his father’s degradation and crimes have made him self-conscious about his intelligence and his morals. He believes that his father’s predilections for lying and theft are also within him. He goes as far as to tell Stella that “‘I fuck people for money, and when that’s not enough… […] I think about stealing it. I plan it in my head, who I’d take it from, the lies I’d say, how I could cover my tracks. Because I’m just like my dad’” (248). Michael compares himself to his father for his thoughts of how to get the necessary means to get his family out of debt and is not comforted when Stella tries to reject this claim. Further, Michael suffers from feelings of inferiority that directly result from his father’s dislike of his passions. Michael studied fashion design and was successful enough to be scouted to New York, a direct violation of his dad’s desire for him to be an engineer. Their resulting conflicts degraded Michael’s self-esteem so that when he sees Stella and Phillip talking, he feels inferior. He equates education to intellect, a misconception that drives him away from Stella.
These struggles with self-confidence and self-love culminate at the novel’s conclusion when both Stella and Michael experience epiphanies about their worth during their separation. Stella’s comes from Janie, who interviews for an internship position and talks about the beauty of numbers and how they enable understanding. Stella gains clarity that although she interacts with the world differently, she does not do so in a way that is wrong. Her difference of perspective is powerful, and she moves back into her patterns and preferences, She thus loves herself, and her autism, for the first time. Janie similarly spurs Michael, though it is her achievements that cause him to resume his life’s work. Seeing that his family is safe and watching his loved ones move forward with their lives inspires Michael to do the same, establishing a business with Quan. He accepts that his education is of a different kind than Stella’s but is no less valid or important.
Their individual, intrinsic self-love is what enables their eventual reconciliation. Had they not come to accept these parts of themselves, they would have forever lived in pursuit of something unattainable. Instead, they discover their places in the world, which allows them to enter a relationship with renewed harmony.
Differences in Expressing and Understanding Love
A difficulty both within the novel and in real-world relationships is the difficulty of understanding how people express their love. People have different ways of giving and receiving love, and those differences in expression can sometimes cause discord. This is evident in The Kiss Quotient from the differences in how Stella and Michael approach their relationship.
Stella struggles with social interactions and often feels as if she has committed social blunders because of her honesty and her difficulty understanding cues. For example, the first time that Stella meets Michael’s family, she does not understand why her questions are causing distress and ultimately makes Michael’s mother cry. Stella also dislikes spontaneous physical contact with most people, Michael being the exception. Because she does not desire material goods and has a significant amount of money, Stella is inclined to show her love through gifts and other financial components. Stella’s wealth, however, makes Michael uncomfortable due to his own history with obsessive clients. He rejects her offer to buy him a car, not understanding it as an expression of love until the end of the novel. This is only resolved when Stella explains her theory that women buy underwear for the men that they love as an extension of their affection. Michael then sees that gifts are her love language and is more accepting of her offer to buy him a car at the novel’s close after their engagement. Stella further explains her spending choices when Michael discovers that she paid for his mother’s medical bills. She states, “‘That’s kind of what you’re supposed to do with money like that, isn’t it? Give it away? I can support myself with my salary. It’s just money, Michael’” (297-98).
Michael, however, shows his love through both acts of service and physical affection. His initial turn to escorting was done out of love for his family, for he wanted to support his mother and ensure her financial freedom. He continued to escort because of her cancer, lying to her about insurance to make sure she did not worry. He cooks for his family, claiming it is because the women don’t. However, as an adult he could easily take care of himself and leave his family to figure things out, but instead cooks for them to show his love. He is also physically affectionate, often touching the people he loves to communicate. He wrestles with his sister, hugs his mother, and often is written as touching or hugging Quan. He is similarly physically affectionate with Stella, both in romantic and casual ways. While Stella likes his touch, when they are intimate, she is conflicted as she remembers the other women he has been with. He warns her against jealousy, but Stella cannot help that inclination as she has blurred the line between Michael’s job and his way of communicating. This is what, in part, prevents her from understanding his true love for her. She spends much of the novel seeing herself as just another client, and it is not until she and Michael reconcile that she realizes how he connects.
The Importance of Communication in Relationships
Stella and Michael’s rift is a direct result of insufficient communication, showing the Importance of Communication for the success of a relationship. Their refusal to tell each other how they feel and talk about key elements of their pasts prevents them from truly connecting, and as such drives them apart. What is said and what goes unsaid in the novel makes up much of the plot, for it is a lack of information that compels most of the character choices.
For example, Stella does not tell Michael about her autism. Rather than explain that aspect of herself and allow them to plan social interactions or outings, she keeps it secret because “She despised it when people had to make changes for her” (141). This stems from her discomfort with her autism, as it would cause people to give her unwanted accommodations. She believes that he does not desire her and tries to seduce him without talking about her autism. Michael finds out about it through Quan, but even he does not tell her that he knows. When they both keep it secret, her autism becomes a malignant thing rather than a different way of living. It puts autism in a shameful context and contributes to Stella’s belief that it makes her unlovable. This is reinforced when Michael leaves her check behind without explaining why, leading Stella to think it is because he pities her. Had the two of them been clear about Stella’s diagnosis from the outset, not only would Stella have been saved from several uncomfortable social situations, but they also could have had much clearer expectations set. Instead, they both avoid the topic of her autism until the end of the book, prolonging emotional intimacy.
Michael is similarly secretive about his father’s past and his mother’s medical debt, which makes Stella self-conscious about herself and prevents her from understanding his motivations. She doesn’t know why Michael turned to sex work, which leads her to assume he has an addiction or similar worst-case scenario. Just like Michael discovers her secret, she discovers his but does not tell him, instead privately arranges for the medical debt to be paid. Michael’s secret about his father causes Stella to commit several social blunders while visiting the Phan-Larsen family. She is prevented from truly knowing Michael, and because of this she is prevented from assuaging his concerns about his morality. Michael’s secrets culminate in their argument, during which they are each exposed. Because this happens at a moment of tension rather than in a willingness to share, they each maintain one key secret: that they love each other. It is not until they have had time apart and grow as individuals that they are confident enough to express their love for each other. When they are explicit about their feelings, expectations, and thoughts, they become much stronger as a couple and enable the novel’s happy conclusion.
