"... is this what it's like to date these days? I'm not asking from the snooty perch of the Smug Married. I am genuinely concerned that this what women are encountering when they are trying to see a movie and get a pizza with three toddlers stacked in a trench coat masquerading as an adult human male."

Confession time: this is my first foray into the literary stylings of Samantha Irby. I hadn't heard of Meaty nor We Are Never Meeting in Real Life prior to cracking this bad boy open. But I do love me a good memoir - especially one written by a funny lady who tells it like it is (haaaaay, Lindy West, Amy Poehler, and Tina Fey!). So when NetGalley (thanks, btw) offered me Wow, No Thank You in exchange for my honest review, much like The Sugarhill Gang, I decided to Jump On It.

This book, as books tend to do, has chapters. But wait! In Wow, No Thank You, each chapter is a standalone essay about... something. Some of these somethings are funny and interesting to read about - like when Sam temporarily moved to Hollywood to be a writer for the Hulu show Shrill. Or when she was trying to make a new adult-friend and got caught in an embarrassing snafu at a restaurant. And I also dug the chapter where she pretends to be an advice columnist. But I found a lot of the stories to be pretty meh. Samantha almost gets a dog, but then instead she (wait for it)... gets a cat (yawn). Samantha moves in with her wife (yawn). Samantha describes, in detail, what it's like to prepare for and then actually go out with friends at the age of almost-40 (big yawn). These chapters had their funny snippets, but overall I wasn't ROTFLMAO. Or even LMAO. Just mildly L.

Two of the chapters had me raising one eyebrow. Yeah, I can do that. lesbian bed death is a seven minute long list of "Sure, sex is fun, but (insert random quasi-sensical thing here)" and hello, 911? is a nine minute long list of quasi-sensical things a quasi-sensical person would not actually call 911 for. And I get it - that's the joke! But it just... isn't that funny.

Look, if Meaty legit gets turned into a television show, I will be watching the sh!t out of that sh!t. Props to Sam for being unapologetically herself, even when that self is far from the cookie-cutter image society tells us we all should strive to be. 'Murica needs more Samantha Irbys and fewer boring-a$$ Kim Kardashians if you ask me. Which I know you did not.

"Imagine feeling like the nine dollars you spent on a discounted paperback book entitles you to rip the shithole out of the person who wrote it! I know you wouldn't do that, but many people are not graced with your impeccable manners."

Sorry :/

This is my third time reading Samantha Irby’s work in as many books and she just keeps getting better and better.

I first heard of Samantha Irby when listening to The Read podcast, one we both listen to and love. Crissle West, who is one of the hosts and has one of the best laughs I’ve ever heard, could not stop raving about We Are Never Meeting In Real Life, Samantha’s second book of essays. Crissle was not wrong. I read that book in one sitting and laughed my ass off, it was so good. Now with her third book of essays, Samantha takes us deeper into her world, now as a married woman.

In Wow, No Thank You, readers still get to read about the author’s past life, food choices, sketchy apartments, and yes, her bowels. But she also writes very candidly about taking care of her mother (which made me cry) and living in a red state with her wife and step kids. Samantha does not hold anything back, and thank god for that. Her openness and humor make me both cringe and laugh like a hyena. And in this scary and isolating time of the Coronavirus, we need all of the laughs we can get.

Thanks to NetGalley, Knopf Doubleday/Vintage Paperbacks, and Samantha Irby for the opportunity to read and review this series of essays. I will preface this review with saying that I'm old, so I'm sure I'm not in the target demographic for this book but there were still so many times I laughed out loud - and loudly - while reading this!

I wasn't familiar with Samantha Irby before reading this book but, hello, that cover! Even if like me you can't quite relate to some of the topics here, you will love the honesty and openness of Irby discussing her health issues and real true life feelings that we probably never admit to ourselves, let alone the world. Trust me - a few of these chapters alone are worth the price of this book. A Guide to Simple Home Repairs was absolutely hilarious, as was Hello, 911.

In today's world of social distancing and fear of everything and everyone, a little humor can only help!

Hello 911?  This book made me laugh so hard I started secreting fluids.
*
There are many kinds of reading enjoyment, and consuming Samantha Irby’s words is the relishing kind. So much about being a woman is being subconsciously on-guard: against media that objectifies you, a country that hates you, and men who do active & passive harm just by being alive and unaware of their systemic privilege. To cast yourself into a book knowing with utter certainty that the writer is on the level—that she knows how bad shit is, but she’s there too, and she’s gonna remind you about the absurd shit and the good shit, and she’s gonna make you laugh about ALL of it...this isn’t what we typically think of as luxury. But it IS luxurious. It feels decadent. Bon-bons on a chaise lounge decadent. Cool ranch Doritos in bed decadent. Canceling plans and ordering delivery so you don't have to leave your dumpster hovel decadent. That is basking in the hot glow of Sam Irby’s hilarity superpower.
*
I picked this book up and didn’t put it down except in moments when I needed both hands free for a full-body wriggle of glee. Things I did while reading this book:
-laughed so hard I had to bury my face in the neck of my hoodie
-laughed so hard I cried
-laughed so hard I spewed La Croix
-laughed so hard i asphyxiated a partially masticated Dorito
-laughed so hard i someone came in from the other room and asked what was the matter
*
This book will make you feel known on a cellular level about everything from taking showers to weird blog obsessions to Having Plans to being a late but passionate iPhone adopter to painstakingly constructed 90s mixtapes to earnest crushes on Janeane Garafolo to “friends” who leave voicemails. And even if none of those things are relatable, you're still likely to laugh yourself breathless and feel more expansive and generous as a result of reading it, because those are the qualities which suffuse every page of Irby's writing.
*
10/10, no splash. Pre-order now.

Yes, please. I love Irby’s dry, self-depreciating wit and enjoyed hearing about her experience working on Shrill because that pool scene, chef’s kiss. Hello, 911? is an instant classic.

It starts off slow and kind of dense, but once the action begins, it's hard to resist the story as it drives forward. It reads as a true epic, one that makes you feel the world really has been reshaped as you read it. Would recommend.

So has getting married, becoming a successful writer, and even writing a culturally-significant episode of television changed Samantha Irby? Nope. At least, not in a bad way. Her life may be more settled, but her writing is as sharp and funny as ever. This is her strongest book so far, a great one for those of us inexorably sliding into middle age carrying the same worries and insecurities we've always had.

Wow, No Thank You is the kind of book that makes me feel less alone. So other people also think this same type of crazy, messed up stuff? Thank you for making me feel less alone and less weird, Samantha Irby. Let’s have dinner.....I promise my credit card will work and I will pay! Her musings on home ownership were so spot on...I can’t blame my shady childhood, my lack of understanding boils down pretty much to laziness, but I can totally relate to her bewilderment of all the intricacies of home care. Her fascination with blogger lifestyle posts mirrors my own. I won’t actually look like that model if I buy this face product? Well, okay but maybe this time I will.....Samantha knows what I mean. I feel all the feels for her crazy mixed up stories!

I should probably preface this with I don't typically read essay collections and decided to start. I've read a couple recently and have decided that in general they are not for me.

With that said, Samantha Irby is an amazing writer. She is relatable and funny and made me laugh out loud. For the most part, the essays in here were great - very well-written and easy to read. She has a great sense of humor and makes you feel like you're reading about yourself. Irby is honest and refreshing and wrote things that people think but won't say out loud.

However, some essays were a little boring or went on just a little bit too long, and the book in general was a little unorganized. Some chapters felt like they were more a thread of tweets than a chapter in book.

I'd recommend this book to people who are fans of personal essay collections and fans of humor.

**Thank you to NetGalley and Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group for providing me with an ARC in exchange from my honest review. [book:Wow, No Thank You.|49960031] is scheduled for release March 31, 2020.

Wow, No Thank You by Samantha Irby is a HOOT! This book caused me to emit some of the ugliest laughs I didn’t know my body was capable of producing.

I received this book from Netgalley as an ARC, and I am trying to get through my stack of TBR books while I am have so much free time. The problem is that I am just not a big of her style of writing. Instead of telling stories, I feel like I am just reading lists. Maybe this works better in blog form, but not so well in a book format.

The third installment in Samantha Irby's trilogy of deep-belly-laughter-inducing essays on her life as a queer, fat, awkward person navigating the world does not disappoint! After reading 'We're Never Meeting in Real Life' and 'Meaty,' I really didn't think she could make me laugh any harder, but I was (thankfully) so very wrong. One of my favorite things about this collection is she shares what the transition has been like as her work has received more attention and provided more opportunities (like writing for the Hulu show Shrill). Despite her foray into Hollywood, Irby's stories still come across as authentic and endearing and make me feel a little less alone in this wild, wild world.

***I received a time-limited digital copy of this title from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review***

Can I just say that this book had me physically laughing out loud, which is exactly what we ALL need to do right now? I adore Samantha Irby and this is actually the first book of hers that I have read. I assure you, it will not be my last. She is witty and very socially astute in an absolutely hilarious way. I enjoyed every word and will continue to slowly savor this title. So funny and so worth your time reading it. Two huge thumbs WAY up for this one!

Samantha Irby is an absolute gem. Not only are her essays laugh-out-loud hilarious, but she is always so unflinchingly honest and absolutely willing to expose what so many people would deem "unfeminine" -- she is a little gross, a little selfish, a little lazy, and absolutely still figuring out who she is even at 40 years old. While I did feel like Wow, No Thank You. was a little less tightly conceived than We Are Never Meeting In Real Life (it felt like there were a lot more "filler" essays here) I will read anything Irby writes, and I hope she will be doing so for many, many more years to come.

Samantha Irby has a knack for being extremely relatable while also making me super jealous that I'm not as funny or talented as her. Fans of Meaty and We Are Never Meeting in Real Life will not be disappointed. My personal favorite chapters were the ones about working on "Shrill" and navigating a book deal because these are things I'm very interested in and curious about and I really appreciate getting the low-down from a Regular Person in a self-deprecating way (I would also be very excited about a big office and stressed about what to put on the office kitchen grocery list!).

Samantha Irby delivers more hilarious and relatable stories of her life with a focus on aging. She’s now forty, married with stepchildren, questioning things like home ownership, and uses an entire day to prepare to leave the house for a night out.

In "girls gone mild", readers learn the hours of preparation that go into a night out:

“I used to party a lot. The only reason I stopped it because I got too old to do it right.”

“5:00 p.m.: it’s put-up-or-shut-up-time.
This is the absolutely latest I can cancel without pissing off my friends…
If I’ve put on a real bra and you pick up the phone to tell me some shit about a headache, I’ll meet you at the club with some Excedrin, bitch.”

In "hung up!" she muses on technology in a satirical and completely relatable way.

"late- 1900s time capsule" is my favorite essay in the collection! Irby reminisces on the music of her youth and gives her readers a special ‘90s mixtape complete with the personal reason behind each selection.
“Mixtapes were the love language of my youth. If you got one from me, that shit was as serious as a marriage proposal.”

"love and marriage" is a hilarious Q+A where Irby answers relationship questions and delivers gems like this: “I have to get over myself and let go of young-person shit that is irritating to me. If I’m too old for it, I don’t give a shit about it.”

"lesbian bed death" is a long list of “Sure, sex is fun, but have you….” and I felt some of these deep in my soul.

Irby also shares her time writing the pilot/pitching her memoir Meaty for TV, and the summer she spent in California writing for Lindy West’s hulu series (adapted from her book of the same title) Shrill.

Wow, No Thank You. is another strong essay collection full of heart and humor that are at times gross and almost always relatable.

I recommend these essays to readers who love humor, personal essays, and memoir.

Thanks to Vintage and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review. Wow, No Thank You. is scheduled for release on March 31, 2020.

Thanks, Netgalley & Vintage, for a free e-copy of this book!

If you liked Irby’s last two books (which I did!) then you will love this one. While you can definitely start with this book, I think it works best if you read them in order, just because she makes lots of little references to things which were discussed in detail in her past books: her traumatic childhood, her job at a veterinarian’s office, her college experiences, and lots of poop stories.

After living in city apartments her whole life, Irby has now moved to a Midwest small town to live with her wife and her step-children. She is now a freelance writer: she writes books, she’s a writer on Shrill, and she still has a blog in the year 2020. While she is insistent that she just spends 14 hours a day scrolling Twitter now that she doesn’t have an office job, we can all see that she is actually in a much more settled, comfortable place in her life now. She is doing great, even if she would never admit it with any type of sincerity!! This brings a slightly different tone to the book: Wow, No Thank You. is a balance of her ridiculous and relatable content about learning how to make friends in a new town, preparing for a night out when you have Crohn’s disease and chronic pain, and how much she unashamedly loved her phone, alongside stories about going to Hollywood with Abbi Jacobson to pitch the TV show version of her book or to work as a writer on Shrill.

This essay collection was perfect for this weird pandemic time where we are all sitting around the house using our phone too much. Right now, I don’t want to read a book about an ambitious person who aspired to be president since they were a toddler. I want to read a book about someone who had no goals, wrote a Myspace blog to get the attention of some guy, and then ended up with three books that she wrote in between episodes of Judge Mathis! This book is funny and comforting and sometimes gross and sometimes heartwarming. I will continue to read everything she writes.

So freaking hilarious! I highlighted so many phrases just so I could go back and reread them. It’s scary how similar our thoughts are. This book isn’t even out yet and I’m already waiting for her next collection of essays!

It's good to see that marriage hasn't softened Samantha Irby's writing too much! This book is just all VOICE, and it's voice I really enjoy reading. I read her previous book, and this book too is very misanthropic, very self-deprecating, and really leans into what is essentially body horror.

Nonetheless, I appreciate it. I love that she's the same age as me and we share so many cultural touchstones, but we're also different enough that reading her work gives me new perspectives. I think a good dose of misanthropy can be good for the soul, to remind us all that we're actually quite boring, and not to take anything too personally.

As with her previous book, it can be a lot to take, and I like it best when there's a hint of sincerity in among the jokes. And overall I'm more of a dick joke person than a poop joke person (I kind of believe we all fall into one category or the other), and there's really a lot more poop jokes in here than I usually care to read.

*** Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. ***

So funny! Bad dates, hosting book clubs, Samantha Irby has a crazy life. Wonderful, laugh out loud funny essays that will make you smile.