Anna Dorn’s third novel Perfume and Pain, out now, is another look into Dorn’s gorgeous, pop culture obsessed brain. With a clear lineage to lesbian pulp novels of the 1950s, Dorn’s novel follows Astrid Dahl, a marginally successful writer who has been lightly canceled and is returning to the Zoom writing group she helped to co-found. When she meets Ivy, a younger sexy librarian type, in the group she’s ready for the distraction from her flailing career. Another distraction comes up in her patchouli smelling neighbor Penelope who Astrid simultaneously disdains but is also attracted to. When her agent tells her that Kat Gold, an actress, is interested in developing one of her novels—Astrid is trying to figure out her shit amidst her greatest vice—the Patricia Highsmith, a mix of booze, cigarettes, and adderall.
Like her previous novels Exalted and Vagablonde, Perfume and Pain is full of women on their worst behavior, plenty of perfect pop culture references, and a healthy heap of lesbian melodrama. Dorn talks with me about her novel, perfume, and her pop culture obsessions.
What was kind of your initial idea for Perfume and Pain?
The initial spark was turning 35. I turned 35 and had this realization that a lot of my bad behavior just wasn't cute anymore. And it probably wasn't cute before that, but for some reason it hit me at 35. And then I saw the two love interests as sort of representing that. There's Ivy, the younger love interest who represents Astrid staying on this dangerous immature path. Then there's the older love interest, Penelope, who represents growth and change.
Have you read lesbian pulp before because the book is so referential to it?
Yes, I had. I think that my writing is naturally a little pulpy in the sense that I have a tendency towards melodrama and I feel like I'm destined to be published in paperback. I've always been drawn to a pulpy sensibility and I had read The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith under her pen name. I'd read her girlfriend Vin Packer’s, which is not her real name, Spring Fire, which is credited as one of the first. I'd read a few and then when I decided when I got this idea that Astrid was going to plagiarize the novel for her Zoom writing class, I had to track down the original Perfume and Pain.
How was it creating Astrid? I mean she sucks in a lot of ways, but she also knows it and she has this windy road to figure herself out in a way that is compelling and realistic too.
I'm the only person I know this intimately, so it does come from me in some way. It's an extremely heightened version of me. I've never been that wild. I feel like she's much hotter than me and much more successful than me. When I'm writing characters because I do get unlikable women. I really like my characters and then I'll go on GoodReads and it's like this character's so unlikable. I'm like, I loved her. I want to marry her. I just am drawn to very flawed women.
Did a lot of it stem from reading the original Perfume and Pain?
I came across this title and this cover and I just fell in love with just the visual and the title. I knew that Astrid was going to plagiarize that book for her Zoom writing class and I knew that I was going to plagiarize the title. I do have a tendency to write my life into existence, not on purpose, but during [writing] I independently developed this obsession with perfume. I am incapable of having a casual interest in anything. So I was spending hours a night on Fragrantica, going to Scent Bar every second. I was accumulating all this knowledge and then it hit me, I should definitely put this in the book because not only is it in the title, but it also works with the themes of the book which are femininity and seduction.
I like that you just said that you're unable to have a casual obsession. One of the reasons why I was so into the book is because so much of your pop culture references are also my obsessions. I feel like that must be fun to kind of figure out what kind of pop culture things these characters are into.
I love pop culture. I'm a little bit too steeped in it. The main thing that I try to avoid with the pop culture references is picking something that's very of that moment. I just try to avoid anything too recent. That's just my brain. I wish I could be less pop culture obsessed, but I can't help it.
How was it mapping out this love triangle? You just mentioned they represent these two different sides of Astrid, but also they're both so extreme in their opposition to one another.
The original inspiration for the Penelope aspect of the love triangle was like Miranda July's The First Bad Man. I was having trouble with the plotting and I was in a bookstore and I just was perusing the shelves being like, I wonder if there's any info here. Then I was thinking about how in The First Bad Man, how she has this woman come live with her, she hates her, but then something shifts and they become lovers. In terms of the lesbian archetypes, they are conglomerations of various people. I wanted to make fun of academia which I did through Ivy and also the Russian which I had too much fun with. Penelope in the beginning, there is this type of self-righteous lesbian archetype that I've definitely come across many times in my dating life. That's kind of like you millennials are on your phone all the time, even though they're literally on Instagram all the time.
Were there fragrances that inspired you while you were writing? You do have so many fun descriptions of perfume in the book.
Well, I got this idea that Penelope spelled like patchouli which felt perfect. I also wanted it to be triggering for Astrid because she's from the Bay Area. There were certain perfumes I was really into as I was writing. It's not mentioned by name, but the moon milk that becomes Astrid's signature scent is Stora Skuggan’s Moon Milk which I was wearing a lot of the time.
I like the way that perfume operates, especially for Astrid, that idea of it making you someone else especially while she's feeling really lost and unsure of who she is in this specific period of time. How did you think about the ways that perfume would move forward the narrative and what it represented for Astrid in different moments?
This idea of having a signature scent is so enticing, but it can be really stressful because it's like you have to think, who am I? I was so deep in my obsession when I was writing this book but I was just thinking about even doing this interview, what are my scents? I'm an earth sign. Does that mean I need to smell like a tree?
Astrid is really at a crossroads in her life and her identity is in flux. I guess your identity is said to harden at 35. You are trying on a lot of different things before that. And I think when you're hit 35, you kind of are more cemented. Your friends are your friends, who you are is who you are, which is why it's also so high stakes that Astrid figures shit out. The signature scent feels very high stakes for Astrid in the same way.
What are some of your favorite scents?
The one that I go to the most is Nemat Amber. It's $11. A lot of people say they can't smell it, but I smell it very strongly and it's not an amber, it's a musk. It's clean, I like to smell nothing. I really like Aesop scents because they are kind of spa-like and also smell very clean.
And Stora Skuggan’s Moon Milk is one that I was obsessed with when I was writing the book and recently put it back in my rotation. And then also Molecule 01 + Patchouli.