I’ve been following @sgbenoit on Twitter for years and have always found her funny and engaging, this book is a welcome extension and far more intimate and self-reflective than I was expecting. There’s a perfect blend of pop-culture commentary, memoir in essays (much of this is very moving and intimate), and her education/evolution in social justice and how to be an effective ally. Going in as a medium-level fan I left this book as a Sophia Benoit stan for life.

I started out reading this book and then switched to the audiobook which is read by her and fantastic. My only criticism and why I deducted a star was because there were a lot of lists in this book and that felt like filler and wasn’t for me.

A great read, highly recommend for memoir lovers, fans of funny women, millennials.

I’ll be honest here- I didn’t know who Sophia Benoit was before requesting her book. I have never read any of her writing, unless her tweets count.

None of that matters- her book is a delight. She appealed to my most insecure self at times, she made me laugh, and she also made me want to be her best friend. I feel like she’s one of the most relatable “famous people” I’ve ever read about.

While I bookmarked and highlighted many paragraphs throughout the reading process, a few things stuck out to me that will also shed some light on what you can expect if and when you pick this up:

“Good cinematography can make even the shittiest things look artistic.”

“An under-talked-about truth is that most friend groups past the age of like twelve revolved around people being attracted to one another.”

“Deodorant also works great under your boobs.”

“Learn how to make three signature dishes. A side, a dessert, and a showstopper that really impresses.”

I could go on, but you need to pick this up and learn for yourself! You don’t need to know Sophia to enjoy her writing. Her goal was to give us moments where we could relate to her life thus far, and I think she achieved it.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster Canada for the advanced eARC of this book!

Benoit is a writer comedian. She writes a sex and relationship advice column for GQ magazine and has a large twitter following. This is her first book. It is a series of humorous essays on her life. She deals with growing up, family, weight issues, sex, the role of women and learning to not care so much about what others think. It is very personal and at times thought provoking.

Well, This Is Exhausting is a memoir from comedian and GC columnist Sophia Benoit. Through her essays, Benoit explores womanhood and feminism and her journey from caring way too much about what others think of her to being comfortable in her own skin. Through her hilarious prose she brilliantly unpacks big issues as a cis woman-- equality, healthcare, relationships and body image.

This collection of essays made me laugh out loud from page one as I read the three different parts: Section One included chapters such as “Too many Servings of Ketchup” and “The Idea Is to Look Like an Idiot”. Section Two includes titles such as, “I’m Not Doing Zumba With You” and section three contains a chapter entitled, “Sorry Dove, I am Never Going to Love My Body”.

Benoit included cackle inducing (I have a very loud laugh) footers which clarified pieces of her hilarity. Her essays were accurate, engaging and very smart. This is the perfect book to have beside your bed or in your bag for sharp observations, fresh perspectives and laughter.

A sincere thank you to Simons & Schuster Canada and NetGalley for the digital ARC.

4 stars

Thank you to Simon & schuster for the ARC! This book was so boring. I got nothing from it. Wish I had more to say, but I had so much trouble getting through majority of it. Nothing was very interesting and I didn’t see the point in many of the chapters - one was essentially just her reviewing her favourite movies?? I did enjoy the chapter that was advice to her sisters, but ended up giving up and DNFing this.

3.5/5 (I rounded up because I think that's fair). I'm writing this review after receiving and ARC from Simon & Schuster Canada.

I have followed Sophia Benoit on twitter for awhile now and when I saw she had a book coming out, I was very excited! I found the book incredibly relatable (as an also white young millennial woman) and her essays specifically on disordered eating/body dysmorphia and being a "chill girl" a relief to read - to see things that I have experienced be written down like that. I think that millennial men would benefit greatly from reading this book as it does a good job at putting the experience of coming to age along with the internet and the rise of white/corporate feminism into words.

Overall, I enjoyed this book because Sophia and I are very similar (age, gender, class, orientation) and there were definitely parts where I laughed out loud, but I also didn't find anything particularly unique about the book or her perspective - which isn't necessarily a bad thing! I also think the book goes a little bit overboard on the footnotes, you can very clearly see the influence from Twitter as most everything that may be considered a generalization includes a caveat in the form of a footnote.

Essay collections are hit or miss for me, and this missed the mark for me. I didn't connect with the writing style, which was disappointing because I really wanted to enjoy the author's stories of growing and learning. As well, reading footnotes in an ebook is not easy, and going back and forth between the end of the chapters and where the footnote was placed became tedious.