Novel Explores Why Millions of College Students Turn to Sugar Daddies to Pay Tuition

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Sugar Baby Club

Bestselling author Teresa Lo is re-releasing her novel, The Sugar Baby Club.

The book examines the growing trend of college students who date older men for financial assistance, and it tells the story of two freshmen who become suga babies in order to fund a study abroad program.

“Older wealthy men dating younger women is a tale as old as time,” Lo said. “And the Cinderella narrative is ingrained in us from a young age. But the reason that The Sugar Baby Club needed to be told now is that there is a huge financial strain put upon recent graduates. They’re leaving college with substantial debt, but they aren’t landing jobs that use their skills or pay them good wages. Many are seeing sugar dating as a way to help them not only thrive but survive in modern times.”

The United States has the most sugar babies in the world, according to The Huffington Post. For instance, on a popular sugar dating website, millions of college students have signed up, looking for allowances, gifts, and mentorship.

“While some may hate the concept of sugar dating, thinking it’s demeaning, it’s a hard truth that everyone needs help to make it in society,” Lo said. “Some people falsely equate sugar dating with prostitution, and while sugar daddies give money or gifts to their sugar baby, it is at the end of the day a relationship. If the two parties are not in a relationship, then their situation is something else.”

Lo is the author of the bestsellers, Hell’s Game and The Red Lantern Scandals. The Red Lantern Scandals is in development with 20th Century Fox Television with Modern Family executive producer Danny Zuker attached to supervise. She is also a journalist who has contributed to publications such as Hustler Magazine, Buzzfeed, Yahoo, Popsugar, Refinery29 and more.

“I spent about a year researching The Sugar Baby Club,” Lo said. “I interviewed almost a hundred people about their experiences, and from the stories I gathered, I created my novel, which is humorous but also very realistic and emotionally raw.”

The second print of The Sugar Baby Club is available as an ebook and as a paperback on Amazon.com. So far, it has generated positive reviews for its page-turning story that explores a complex topic.

“Lo tells her story in a lively, snarky prose that allows the narrative to strut across the page. (Sample dialogue: ” ‘Where’d you get a roofie?’ Kita asked. ‘From a drug dealer in Dolce and Gabbana,’ I said.”) Punchy and fast-paced, the plot pulls the reader forward from the first chapter. While primarily a romp–Jazz is a sassy and self-deprecating narrator–the novel nevertheless manages to explore some of the more serious aspects of sugar dating,” Kirkus Reviews stated.

Teresa Lo is a writer who focuses on sex-positivity, Asian-American issues, and women’s issues. She has published the bestselling books, Hell’s Game and The Red Lantern Scandals; and she is a journalist who has contributed to publications such as Yahoo, Popsugar, Buzzfeed, and Hustler Magazine. Her book series The Red Lantern Scandals is in development at 20th Century Fox Television.

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