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3.66 AVERAGE
3.66 AVERAGE
I didn't enjoy this
I thought I would like this book, I wanted to like it, and I wanted to relate to the author but Levy just proved over and over again how narcissistic and mean-spirited she really was throughout her story. She made many tasteless jokes at the expense of a trans man who she had an affair with by misgendering him when the reader would already get to dislike him for the sneaky cruelties he would perform. It's unnecessary to use a minority that endures endless violence as the butt of a joke. She makes pointed remarks about her "friends" who become mothers or are trying to get pregnant and then she becomes the desperate woman who only wants to be pregnant and paints it as though she is the only woman in the world who has ever lost a baby prematurely. I can empathize with plenty of her struggle but when you write in such an unabashedly self-serving manner, I can't sympathize with Levy as a person. As a person, she seems like a real jerk.
I thought I would like this book, I wanted to like it, and I wanted to relate to the author but Levy just proved over and over again how narcissistic and mean-spirited she really was throughout her story. She made many tasteless jokes at the expense of a trans man who she had an affair with by misgendering him when the reader would already get to dislike him for the sneaky cruelties he would perform. It's unnecessary to use a minority that endures endless violence as the butt of a joke. She makes pointed remarks about her "friends" who become mothers or are trying to get pregnant and then she becomes the desperate woman who only wants to be pregnant and paints it as though she is the only woman in the world who has ever lost a baby prematurely. I can empathize with plenty of her struggle but when you write in such an unabashedly self-serving manner, I can't sympathize with Levy as a person. As a person, she seems like a real jerk.
This book was interesting, but probably would have been more so if I knew more about the author prior to reading the book. It was a belletrist book club recommendation.
What Roxane Gay has to say about this is very true.
I finished this because I was struggling to keep up with Margaret Atwood's Blind Assassin. In the end, I opted to finish this instead first.
I finished this because I was struggling to keep up with Margaret Atwood's Blind Assassin. In the end, I opted to finish this instead first.
First half of book is kind of charming, quirky and she seems like a girl of privilege...almost a little much. The second half of the book wrecked me. Well written to really feel what she felt.
Not an uplifting autobiography, but a very open and raw accounting of the author’s experience with relationships, trying to conceive and an alcoholic spouse. I’m not certain if writing this book was cathartic for the author. I hope that it was. The pressing thoughts in my mind while struggling to continue reading this book was “self-obsessed” and has the author considered “cognitive behavioural therapy”.
2-1/2; quick read
Well written, but got a bit tired of the formulaic way each of the chapters ended. Memoirs are tough, and endings don't really happen. You can tell everything sort of fell apart for her, and it seems the writing didn't know how to deal with that either. And as others have mentioned, there is certainly privilege in her life as well, tho she does seem to realize this at times.
P11 "other times, they were aghast to recognize their own entitlement, staring back at them magnified in the mirror of their offspring"
P52 "that trip was like all my life, distilled: a compulsion to thrust myself toward adventure, offset by a longing to crawl into the pouch of some benevolent kangaroo who would take me bounding, protected, through life"
Well written, but got a bit tired of the formulaic way each of the chapters ended. Memoirs are tough, and endings don't really happen. You can tell everything sort of fell apart for her, and it seems the writing didn't know how to deal with that either. And as others have mentioned, there is certainly privilege in her life as well, tho she does seem to realize this at times.
P11 "other times, they were aghast to recognize their own entitlement, staring back at them magnified in the mirror of their offspring"
P52 "that trip was like all my life, distilled: a compulsion to thrust myself toward adventure, offset by a longing to crawl into the pouch of some benevolent kangaroo who would take me bounding, protected, through life"
3.5/4. I didn’t want to stop reading it, it was really well-written.
I loved Female Chauvinist Pigs (the first feminism book I ever read at age 15. Whoops.), but I wasn't as in love with this one. I was often frustrated by how selfish Ariel was. Especially towards the end. The writing was awesome and her feelings about motherhood and matrimony struck a chord with me.
A quick memoir to read. Not sure how much of it will stick with me as there were times I didn't care for the author. Even as a privileged white woman myself I kept thinking it was amazing she expected things to always work out the way she wanted. Not that that makes her story less painful or real. Just me judging...