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arielmobes's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
funny
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
emilyinlibraryland's review against another edition
2.0
I truly hated this book. It was disjointed and meandering and I couldn’t tell when anything was happening. Everyone in the book is barely even a cardboard cutout of a character. Basically the book only exists because the author’s husband had to have eye surgery and they had to move back in with her parents, but over the course of 300+ pages all I learned about him was his name and the eye thing. Ok, so I guess the book is about her family...but they never come to seem like real people either. I think I’m supposed to see their humanity? But this book just made me hate them. Speaking of which, horrible bombshells would occasionally drop, but then barely matter and never be mentioned again? Like, oh yeah there was that time I tried to kill myself, my dad told me I ruined his day, I got my stomach pumped, and now here’s a *hilarious* story about how my sister is actually a panther, haha!
When this book came out, there was so much buzz about it and I kept hearing how funny it was, but I really did not get that. There are jokes and what I would class as an over-reliance on exaggeration for comedic effect, but it all had an uncomfortable air of desperation.
I left feeling sad for the author because she seems pretty not OK and her family is hot garbage, and now me and a bunch of other people read all about it.
When this book came out, there was so much buzz about it and I kept hearing how funny it was, but I really did not get that. There are jokes and what I would class as an over-reliance on exaggeration for comedic effect, but it all had an uncomfortable air of desperation.
I left feeling sad for the author because she seems pretty not OK and her family is hot garbage, and now me and a bunch of other people read all about it.
shannanigans's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
hopeful
informative
lighthearted
reflective
sad
medium-paced
greenmama23's review against another edition
challenging
funny
reflective
medium-paced
4.25
More poetry than prose, this memoir gives a stream of consciousness feel while firmly rooted in time and space.
bookook's review against another edition
emotional
funny
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
Incredible - a real "bumblebee sting to the clit," as the author' husband suggests as a blurb for her first published poetry collection. This book is hard to describe and deeply weird and very lovable. I don't really know what else to say, so I'm just going to copy in some of my favorite excerpts. Too hard to pick!
"Just look at him,” Jason says, with something approaching awe, all five of the journalistic Ws present in his eyes, plus a single shining H. But faith and my father taught me the same lesson: to live in the mystery, even to love it.
"Just look at him,” Jason says, with something approaching awe, all five of the journalistic Ws present in his eyes, plus a single shining H. But faith and my father taught me the same lesson: to live in the mystery, even to love it.
“Who knows what a freak might do,” my mother hissed, which sounded almost like a philosophical koan. Who DOES know what a freak might do. Could God make a freak so big even he didn’t know what it might do?
If it had been a letter, Jason would have snatched it out of my hand and clasped it to his heaving breast. Instead, he makes me read the email to him over and over, until my voice begins to sing in its familiar course. “You did it,” he says, bursting into tears. “This is just like when an animal succeeds in a movie.”
cazzie's review against another edition
dark
funny
informative
medium-paced
4.25
Quirky, hilarious, perplexing insight into life with an evangelical right wing Priest Daddy in the USA. Wonderful writing; a poet's sensibilities.
erickibler4's review against another edition
4.0
When Lockwood, is funny, which is often, she's hilarious. I laughed out loud many times while reading this book. I guess being a poet, though, means that when you're in "poet mode", you have to be somewhat opaque. Sometimes in the more poetic passages, I couldn't follow her train of thought.