The hottest thing a man can do is go to therapy.
That was it—that was the one-line review for my upcoming book, Extracurricular, that stopped me in my tracks.
The character in question is, yes, very hot. (I made him up, I can say that!) He’s a psychology professor with a slutty little earring, a confident golden retriever of a man who roots tirelessly for the worst team in the NBA.
And yet his most attractive trait? The fact that he’s working on himself.
When a former pop star enrolls in college, the last thing she expects is A-plus chemistry with her psychology professor in this sexy and tender romance from #1 New York Times bestselling author Rachel Lynn Solomon.
To be clear, I love that review. I’ve dealt with depression, anxiety, and OCD for most of my life. I’ve been on and off different medications and in and out of therapy, so it’s only natural that mental health has found a way into my storytelling. Whether I’m writing a workplace romance, an expat love story, or something with a touch of the taboo, my characters are always figuring themselves out along the way. And that journey probably isn’t linear… because it rarely is in real life.
On the surface, Extracurricular is a forbidden student-professor romance about a retired pop star who decides to go back to college. What may not be obvious from the summary, though, is that both those characters are in therapy. Ramona is recovering from a toxic career that nearly pushed her to a breaking point, and Nick is processing the aftermath of a divorce. Neither of them is cured by the end of the book—but they do fall for each other, slowly revealing their vulnerabilities when they realize they’ve found someone they can trust.
Romance novels are the perfect place to explore mental health, in part because there’s always the guarantee of a soft place to land at the end. But it’s more than that—I think it’s crucial to show people who are fully deserving of love, even when their own brains are working against them.
In all honesty, it took me a while to figure this out. I used to think writing about mental health meant making it The Main Plot, even though I’m more interested in stories where a mental illness just happens to be part of the character’s life and not their entire world. When I outlined these types of books, I’d envision a third-act breakup scene where the main character decides they need to seek help for their mental illness before they’re ready to be in a relationship. But the way they’d hit pause would be too cliché, too manipulated by me as the author. I was hunting for a climax, a reason to break them up so I could bring them together again.
“Sometimes the hottest thing anyone can do, regardless of gender, is go to therapy…while also demonstrating some top-tier yearning for the person they’re not supposed to want.”
Of course, no two mental health journeys are the same. And while sometimes choosing to be single for a bit might be the healthiest approach—and in certain cases might truly be necessary—it’s not always the most realistic. Sometimes a relationship is two people digging themselves out together, supporting each other while one or both of them undergo treatment. And I’m not sure there’s any truer expression of love.
These days, I’m trying to show more nuance in my writing. I want to write those stories about two people digging themselves out together, and that was my goal with Extracurricular. There’s a (non-spoiler!) quote toward the end that I hope captures that exact sentiment:
“When you showed up in class the first day of the quarter, I was so deep in my own head, I didn’t know if anything could drag me out. And then you were there, insulting me and challenging me and making me believe I could trust someone again. We were both in the dark, I think, but somehow we could still see each other.
“The timing and circumstances were… questionable,” he continues with a quarter smile, “but Ramona, you didn’t just drag me out of the dark. You gave me a flashlight, and you let me follow you.”
As a reader, I’m similarly drawn to books that show a breadth of experiences—characters on wild romantic adventures while they work through mental health challenges, whether they’re already in therapy or taking medication, or if making those decisions is part of their character arc.
Sometimes the hottest thing anyone can do, regardless of gender, is go to therapy… while also demonstrating some top-tier yearning for the person they’re not supposed to want.
With that in mind, I hope you enjoy reading Extracurricular once it releases as much as I did writing it, but in the meantime, here are some of my favorite romance novels that normalize mental health treatment:
This one is a gem because it’s all about mental health. The protagonist is a therapist opening a bed-and-breakfast for the brokenhearted, and there’s nothing but empathy for every character who books a room there—and especially for the love interest, the property’s landlord with a complicated history of his own. O’Clover strikes a balance between realistic and escapist with lush descriptions of the Colorado setting. A warning: the last sentence will sink into your bones and stay with you forever.
The premise is such classic romcom perfection, even the title is poking fun at it. A podcaster and her producer anonymously fall in love over email, unaware they already know and can’t stand each other in real life. What sets this book apart is how richly developed the characters are. Katz excels at making them feel like real people—you swoon with them, you rage with them, you hurt with them. From page one, the book lets us know that main character Yael is on medication, and her bipolar disorder is written with utmost thought and care. Yael is never reduced to a stereotype—rather, it’s simply one facet of her identity.
This debut follows a skeptic and a cryptid expert who team up on a web series devoted to debunking (or proving, depending on who you ask) paranormal conspiracy theories. It’s a little quirky, a little spooky, and one hundred percent entertaining. The touch of the supernatural is deftly balanced by the way Marlowe weaves in authentic, realistic depictions of mental health. The hero is living with depression and grief, and therapy and antidepressants are both casually mentioned. It’s so refreshing to see that normalized, particularly for men.
A woman falls for the sister of the man she’s fake-dating while on their family’s annual Christmas cabin trip. It might sound messy, but Cochrun’s charming writing makes it easy to get on board with the setup. And who doesn’t want a little mess in their romance? Protagonist Ellie is an animator who recently lost her dream job, and she’s been struggling with generalized anxiety disorder and panic attacks. This was actually one of the first holiday romances I read that convinced me I might like holiday romance. It’s an utter delight full of imperfect, endearing, unforgettable characters.
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Rachel Lynn Solomon, Bestselling Author
Rachel Lynn Solomon writes about imperfect people falling in love. She is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Ex Talk, Business or Pleasure, Today Tonight Tomorrow, and other romantic comedies for teens and adults. Her books have been optioned for film and translated into 20 languages.
Feature graphic images credited to: Sabreen Lakhani | Rachel Lynn Solomon, Cassie Kollmeyer | Dupe. Products included in graphics linked within article.
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