amlohf 's review for:

Black Friend by Ziwe

3.0

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The structure of this book bothered me. Footnotes are fine. I find hiding snark in the footnotes to be a fun tool for comedy. However, what was the point of the greyed sections? Usually it has nothing to do with the text surrounding it, and I had a hard time understanding the order in which I was supposed to read these parts of the book. The later essays were stronger than the earlier ones. I've honestly never heard of Ziwe before reading this, so I had no context to her comedic voice, and I don't think I fully comprehend how to separate the comedy from the memoir from the serious race critiques. I know there can be a combination, but I just found myself wondering so many times whether she's kidding or if she actually believes some of this stuff. Just didn't land for me overall despite the fact that I really liked the affirmative action essay the the essays preceding and proceeding that one.