A wacky, multiverse-hopping romantic comedy about a man traversing alternate worlds to profess his love for his best friend
“Every version of Gary understands the same rule: say nothing and keep her, say something and risk the universe.”
What do you do when you find yourself in love with the one person you can’t seem to have? Keep silent to protect your friendship or tell them and risk it all? Gary Leslie, the overthinking, hopeless romantic protagonist of this novel, isn’t the only one who’s found himself asking this question, but he just might be the only one testing out the effects of it through alternate realities.
Nick Gregorio’s multiverse-rich romantic comedy Jen & Gary’s Infinite (Quantum) Entanglements begins with Gary almost making the irreversible decision to confess his feelings to his married best friend, Jen Scott, when he’s pulled through a wormhole in his apartment. As he tumbles through this void, his life literally flashes before his eyes—more specifically, his long, complicated history of his feelings for Jen.
Gary first met Jen when she was hired at his marketing agency and was instantly smitten, but before he could act, Jen got engaged and had a son. Years later, she interviews him for a new job, and they rekindle a close, platonic friendship. He becomes best friends with her and her husband, Dan, eventually entering an on-again, off-again relationship with a woman named Shawna.
Despite this relationship, he harbors a deep, unrequited love for Jen throughout. His decision to finally leave his predestined path as the silent, suffering friend begins his chaotic tour through alternate realities where he finds different versions of Jen and their connection is always hampered by bizarre complications. In one situation, he’s in a dinosaur world as a Dino sapien with Shawna as his dinosaur-girlfriend and with dinosaur-Jen and Dan as their best friends. In this alternate reality, he exposes Jen’s husband and triggers a brawl. His distress causes another wormhole to open, and on and on the cycle continues.
The novel is structured as a compilation of case files that document their romantic and existential entanglements across multiple parallel universes in an observational tone, creating the impression that their story is being studied, leaning into philosophical inquiry and speculative science fiction. Gregorio’s use of constantly changing worlds keeps things ever-surprising and genuinely unpredictable; you can’t possibly know whether the outcome of their meeting will be tragic, funny, cosmic, normal, or romantic, or when exactly it’ll all end. And where he’ll end up when it does.
However, because they’re constantly jumping across realities, there isn’t much time to get to know and connect with each version before they jump off to the next version—instead we get pieces of them. Their characterization is developed over time and in different circumstances. There are some instances where the dialogue feels more functional than natural though, even in vital moments later in the plot.
The scientific framing paired with such deep romantic vulnerability produces the book’s brightest shine: “You, Gary, are the arrow… And our multiverse is the balloon.” It feels fresh and new while still giving us that classic romantic comedy feel we miss from the 90s and early 2000s. Gregorio skillfully captures multiple themes here, such as probability vs. inevitability and destiny vs. choice.
Jen & Gary’s Infinite (Quantum) Entanglements is an inventive and philosophically playful novel that explores love as a universal constant and the difference between persisting love and selfishness.
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