The Knockout Queen, A novel

Rufi Thorpe returns to the subject that made her debut novel *The Girls from Corona del Mar* so endlessly compelling: the complexity and urgency of best friendship. In *The Knockout Queen* two unlikely friends form an alliance—a slight, hyper-intelligent gay teen named Michael Hesketh and his next-door neighbor, the remarkably tall Bunny Lampert. Each is antagonized for their differences—Michael for being attracted to the “wrong” people (much older men from the Internet) and Bunny for having the “wrong” body, one with a strength she can’t always control. As their bond intensifies, an accidental act of violence leaves both characters, and their friendship, forever transformed.

*The Knockout Queen* is about the lengths we go to protect our friends, and what happens when the binding threads of love are stretched to their snapping point. This is Rufi Thorpe at her finest: intoxicatingly charismatic storytelling, a compelling, seductive talent with every sentence.