“Hello, 911? I’ve been lying awake for an hour each night, reliving a two-second awkward experience I had in front of a casual acquaintance three years ago, for eight months.”
Samantha Irby is my spirit animal. She truly embraces an impassioned, albeit self-deprecating, humor in a way that no else has or ever will. Starting as a not-so-humble and all-too-honest blogger and rising to a New York Times bestselling author, Irby has definitely earned a place on the humor wall of fame. I've gone on to read every single one of her publications, from her debut blog to her e-book short entitled New Year, Same Trash: New Year's Resolutions I Absolutely Did Not Keep, and they are all equally side-splitting. The books are brilliant, but I highly recommend listening to the audiobooks as they are narrated by the author which amplifies their hilarity ten-fold.
“Everyone thinks I’m going to eventually die of a heart attack, but joke’s on y’all—it’s definitely going to be of secondhand embarrassment.”
If you’ve ever read her previous works, New York Times bestsellers Meaty and We Are Never Meeting in Real Life, you’ll know she covers such topics as: deliberately creating false first impressions on dates, working in customer service when you’re the last person who should be, crippling anxiety, adult diapers, pursuing goals and men that are both equally unattainable, the cycle of grief you experience after stupidly making plans with friends and having to actually follow through with them, as well as being mistaken somehow for author Roxanne Gay - you know, the real (good) stuff.
In Wow, No Thank You, Irby embraces new challenges and embarrassments: from becoming a step-mom after marrying a woman with children to moving to the middle of nowhere to writing for Hollywood, all while wearing orthopedic sandals and trying to wrap her head around the nutritional benefits of chia seeds. Delightfully demented and covertly heartfelt, Irby’s writings are so offbeat and upbeat that you’ll wonder how you survived so long without her in your life.
“I approach most endeavors with zero expectations, which is a skill I have honed after forty years of fairly regular disappointment.”
If only we could all be as honest and self-aware as Samantha Irby. Before reading her essays, I never realized you could beat yourself up while applauding yourself at the same time. I also never knew self-deprecation could be so empowering. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll pee your pants... But it’ll be worth it.
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