My New Best Friend

So, I first found the Bloggess in the early 2000's and loved her tone and style and dry edge. But as happens, we drifted apart. This book, her third, seemed like a great chance to get back in touch. Well, busy, busy, busy.

I understand that authors create and cultivate a "persona" and that celebrity is a mask. I don't actually know Jenny Lawson. But more than any other cultural/humor writer I can think of her work feels absolutely authentic and genuine. (I sometimes get that vibe from Paula Poundstone.) That authenticity adds extra punch and appeal to everything she writes, and as silly as it sounds, I'm happier when I'm reading her essays.

Don't be fooled or misled, because I don't want you to be disappointed when you read this book. The book is both hilariously funny, in parts, and intensely personal about being broken, (in parts). Perhaps the Lawson genius is that she often is able to combine those two aspects of her writing in a single paragraph and even a single proudly ungrammatical sentence.

This is the sort of book that you read through once in its entirety, taking the rough with the smooth. Then when you need a little Jenny you can skim to your favorite parts and re-appreciate her comedic timing and wordplay and unique deadpan-manic humor. Jenny Lawson, my BFF.

(Please note that I received a free advance ecopy of this book without a review requirement, or any influence regarding review content should I choose to post a review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)

Oh, Jenny. How I love you!

This book is Lawson’s third and it is just as magical as her first two, Let’s Pretend This Never Happened and Furiously Happy.

I’ve been a big fan of Jenny Lawson way back in the aughts (I like saying that; it makes me feel like a cranky old lady - #lifegoals), when she was known simply as The Bloggess. In 2007, I wasn’t even sure what a blog was. But I knew she wrote some seriously funny shit on the Internet.

This book, like her previous ones, describes her battles with depression and anxiety along with her everyday observations on life with her signature wit and wacky humor. I literally laughed out loud when she was describing how she keeps losing one of her shoes in weird places, and also her family’s experience having to hunt down buttworm (pinworm??) medicine at the drugstore.

One story relates how a bag of miniature penises (sent by a fan) spilled all over her car and went into all the “car holes” (in other words, the black holes where the french fries go), and she busted into her husband’s office to tell him that her “car holes were full of tiny penises” while he was on a conference call. It reminded me of the time when I walked through a hornet swarm and ran into the house screaming about “murder hornets” and yep, my husband was on a business call. Thus, I can totally relate to Jenny.

If you’ve ever battled with depression or anxiety or self-worth, or if you just like laughing out loud while reading funny stories, you should definitely read this book. It’s not due out until April 2021, so until then, check out her previous titles!

Jenny knocks it out of the park again!! If you haven’t read her other books, go do it now!! In her latest tale, she talks about her experience with TMS treatment for her anxiety and depression, which doesn’t sound like it would be laugh out loud funny, but I assure you, it is.

Jenny always manages to speak to the low lows of depression in such a candid and real way, that people like me who have been there, and sometimes are still there can relate to very personally, but also about the glimmers of light and happiness in a way that reminds me that this doesn’t last forever.

Peppered in, as usual are more hilarious anecdotes about her husband, daughter, parents. sister, and pets that will have you laughing out loud in the most inappropriate places.

I find it incredibly telling when an author can make you feel extreme joy, empathy, sadness, compassion and happiness all at once. Lawson nailed it.

In one chapter, she pens a letter to her insurance company asking them if they want her to die. Lawson is depressed and suffers from a myriad of health issues and is getting constant rejections for her medications and treatments. The letter and stories about her health are heartbreaking and telling of our current healthcare system.

Then she literally segues in the next chapter to a story involving her neighbor, a bug on a sidewalk and Victor on a conference call. I was full-on laughing so hard that I couldn’t breathe. I read the chapter out loud to my husband a second time and had to stop because even reading it the second time made it that much better.

The magic of Lawson’s book is the back and forth - between the light and the dark; the truth to her life as she’s living it. Her illness and how it debilitates her, but also her marriage, her real-talk with her editors, and her sending a disco ball to a monkey refugee camp because they wouldn’t take the tiny roller skates she wanted to send them.

I love Jenny Lawson. She writes from her heart and she writes about the tough subjects. However, she will make you laugh your fanny off while doing it. I laughed through most of this book and when she got serious I got serious with her. This is one of those where you'll laugh, you'll cry and you'll read the best parts out to anyone who will listen.

If you have never read Jenny Lawson, she suffers from depression. In this book she describes what it is like to suffer from crippling depression and how it affects the person's life. She talks about her struggles with autoimmune diseases, including RA, with a spectacular chapter on how she accidentally got TB. Her books make me feel warm and fuzzy and when I am in a dark place myself, she is there to comfort me.

I know that last paragraph makes this book sound like a real downer. I promise you it is not. Jenny is extremely clever and hilarious and some of the situations she gets into remind me a lot of I Love Lucy, only with more taxidermy. She writes from the heart and I just love escaping into her books. I cannot say enough wonderful things about Jenny and her books. She reaches out to an audience that is often ignored and gets real about some dark and scary places. I appreciate her honesty, her struggles and her ability to still laugh about life in general

Thank you Netgalley and Jenny Lawson for allowing me to read this in advance!

Jenny Lawson made me feel ALLLLLLLLL the feels, and I loved every second of it. I've been following her blog for years now, and have always been delighted by her sense of humor and how she translates that on paper/screen. As a therapist who also happens to be living with depression/anxiety, I also deeply appreciate how she writes about her personal mental health experiences in such an accessible, gut-wrenchingly honest way. Like her other books, this one did not disappoint. Some chapters had me laughing till I had tears streaming down my face and then laughing even harder when I realized I was nervously checking around myself to make sure no one was staring at me oddly (I was in my own dining room, alone). Others, like the poignant letter to her insurance company, built up such a righteous rage in me that I, once again, wanted to cry. Thanks to Ms. Lawson, I'll need to re-stock up on tissues before the next COVID surge and subsequent hoarding of supplies. But you know what? I'm not even mad at it. It is totally worth it. Jenny Lawson is a national treasure who can make me cry whenever she wants.

I was so excited to get an ARC of this book from NetGalley. I always love Jenny Lawson’s books—the raw honesty, the humor, her perspective on life and struggle. But I think I love this book even more than her others, maybe because I’m older and I’ve been through more in my life than I had last time I read one of her books. I really appreciate how hard the author works to just get through her life, she expresses so well how debilitating that kind of anxiety and depression can be. I’d probably swear as much as she does if my days were more like hers.
I laughed so hard in some parts I couldn’t breathe (the chapter of everyone sharing their most embarrassing moments on Twitter). Other chapters when she’s talking about her anxiety and depression treatments and struggles with her insurance, I cried until I didn’t want to cry anymore, then somehow she turned it around at just the right moment so I was laughing again. One chapter I had to skip altogether (her Shark Tank ideas were just too vulgar for me to get through). In other parts I related to her stories so well I thought we’d grown up together—eating white bread with gravy is just as delicious as she says (although unlike her family, we ate that because we liked it, not because that was all we could afford). By the end, mostly I just appreciated her. I came away hoping she would have more good days than bad and be ready to share more of her hilarious and heartfelt stories with her readers.

All the run ins and ramblings didn’t do it for me. Couldn’t get past the first couple of pages. No thanks.

Jenny Lawson's new book does not disappoint. In her usual style, she seamlessly weaves back and forth between her crazy stories that have you laughing out loud, to the very real ways that depression continues to impact her life. It's impossible to finish this book and not be thankful for the gift that her life is and the way she uses her writing to share it with all of us. While some of the material is heavy, stick with her to come out to the other side, ready to embrace all of the crazy that life seems to drop on her doorstep.

Jenny Lawson is very funny in a highly inappropriate and sarcastic way, and I love her for it. I definitely laughed out loud when I was reading this, even when home alone. This book isn't for people offended by 4-letter words. Like in her previous books, Lawson focused heavily on her own journey with mental illness but it seems approachable and relatable to those whose own mental illness is less severe.

This book is more hopeful than her last one, and it was great to see the author experience significant improvements in her anxiety and depression due to an intensive type of treatment she seeks out. Virtually everyone in the US can probably relate to her chapter raging about her health insurance company and their arbitrary rules for what they will cover and what they won't. (It's a bit like the "Dear American Airlines" book, but shorter and angrier.)

Overall, anyone who enjoyed the author's previous books will like this. I also recommend it for fans of Laurie Notaro and Allie Brosh.

I really liked Furiously Happy, so I was excited to read Jenny Lawson's new book Broken. My verdict is that it is A-OK. Some essays were 2s and 3s, and some were 4s and 5s. I found that overall I was skipping over the more silly stories, and became really invested in her more serious stories about her anxiety and dealing with chronic illness. Sometimes I felt that her funnier stories would have done better as blog posts, cutting down on the amount of them in the book and making it a shorter and more cohesive narrative. Either way, I love the way Lawson writes so genuinely and honestly about her experiences, and how she still manages to find humor in hard situations.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this book in exchange for an honest review.
What a perfect book to read during this drama-filled year. Jenny Lawson's humor and honesty are a breath of fresh air. Her chapters about her struggles with mental illness are so relatable, especially "An Open Letter To My Insurance Company". Other chapters are laugh-out-loud funny and quirky. Her writing style won't work for some people but give this book a chance because there are a lot of good points.

I adore Jenny Lawson! She always has me laughing out loud and nodding my head because she gets me! This was a fun read to help escape the things in life that are weighing us all down right now. Some of her writing is hectic but I think that's just who she is. It doesn't bother me. I will continue to read her stuff in the future.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC!

Jenny Lawson is a national treasure!! Hilarious, heartbreaking, amazing, everything I was hoping for and more! I cannot say enough of Jenny Lawson and her work. I go from crying from sadness to crying and howling with laughter. Jenny takes the reader on a wild ride through her depression and anxiety and her triumphs. She can't write enough in my opinion. Keep it up, Jenny! We're with you all the way. I give this book ALLLLLL the stars!!

Some of these essays were really well written and impactful and some of them were very goofy and the tonal shifts back and forth were kind of jarring for me?

Just what this horrible year needs right now is the return of Jenny Lawson, who is really the ONLY author ever to make me LOL so hard I cry, blow milk out my nose and pee my pants, all at the same time. I've now read all four of her books, and this is something of a return to the full power she exhibited in her first classic (Let's Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir).

Along with the side-splitting, sometimes implausible, yet entirely true mishaps she relates, are also some sobering chapters that deal more intimately with her issues with anxiety and other illnesses, both mental and physical; along with her battles with medical professionals and dastardly insurance companies to get the help she needs. Long-suffering husband Victor and sister Lisa are back, as well as a cameo from the taxidermied mice of the first book, and a full contingent of bewildered new encounters. Some chapters don't quite measure up - the Shark Tank ideas one goes on much too long and devolves into some sophomoric scatology, but those missteps are few and far between. It's just a real comfort to have Ms. Lawson back to remind us that no matter how bad things are - she's probably had it worse!

Sincere thanks to Netgalley and Henry Holt & Company for the opportunity and privilege to preview and honestly review this book a full 5 months before it's available to the rest of you! :-)

Sometimes awkward/shitty/crazy things happen, and you've just got to laugh. That was my main takeaway after reading this, which is a great reminder in this disaster of a year. It wasn't exactly my brand of humor, but there were still plenty of laugh-out-loud moments, However, I found myself most engrossed during some of the more serious essays. Her frank descriptions of living with autoimmune disorders, the letter to her health insurance company, and the TMS therapy journal entries stood out to me in particular, I think it is fantastic that Jenny Lawson can be describing outlandish and shocking scenarios, and yet still somehow be completely relatable. I am also thankful that there was a note about the cover at the end, because it made me pause for a moment to actually take a look and appreciate it - kudos to the artist, Omar Rayyan.

I received a copy of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This reads like a signature Jenny Lawson book.

It's funny, it's full of anxiety and fear and funny stories. The first almost half dives into Lawsons' mental and physical health. It's sad and relatable and so wonderfully well written. It captures the struggles of getting insurance to cover medications you know you need and trying to navigate out of depression.

The rest of the book is other anecdotes and stories. I don't think I've read a Lawson book where there isn't at least a couple stories about rodents and this is no exception. From social anxiety to fights with her spouse Lawson shares pieces of her life.

While repetitive at times this book is also laugh out loud funny and genuine.

Jenny Lawson is one of my favorite authors. Her funny and insightful explanations of living with chronic illness, anxiety and depression shape how I explain these things to myself and others. This book is pure Lawson. Her brokenness is devastating at times, hilarious and uplifting at others. One note for frequent readers of her blog, you will recognized several chapters of this book. However the best stuff here is original.

I laughed so hard that I cried so many times that my 6 year old kept asking me if I was reading my joke book again.

Some essays are heartbreaking and others are hilarious. Jenny Lawson has such an honest take on her mental illness.