A review by crybabybea
Dear Girls: Intimate Tales, Untold Secrets, and Advice for Living Your Best Life by Ali Wong

3.75

I went into this knowing nothing about Ali Wong and also knowing nothing about stand-up comedy, so I wasn't exactly the target audience for this memoir, but I still surprisingly had a fun time and enjoyed listening to it. 

I'm not a super big fan of raunchy/dirty comedy, but I found Ali Wong's approach kind of endearing and wholesome. She makes herself the butt of jokes before anyone else can, and it makes her come across as very open-minded and shame-free. I think her comedic approach really worked well for a memoir written as a letter to her daughters. As terrifying as it would be to read about your mom's sexcapades and fecal matter, there were a lot of truly heartfelt moments that broke up the overwhelming amount of poop jokes (seriously, there's lots of poop). But the whole thing was just filled with a tone of passion and genuine love and I found it moving despite the over-the-top comedy. 

She briefly touched on some more political topics, like how she defines her identity as an Asian-American woman in a male-dominated career field, but it wasn't the main focus and I enjoyed that each absolutely unhinged story circled back around to a word of advice for her girls.

I found her narration in the audiobook to be super entertaining too and made it easy to keep listening.

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