I reached for Zosia Mamet's "Does This Make Me Funny" out of curiosity. I like reading essays very much, and earlier I read a collection of essays written by her father. This time, I expected a somewhat lighthearted collection of anecdotes about Hollywood, written from the perspective of someone younger, a new generation. Zosia's status as a nepo baby looked intriguing and promising at the same time.

The collection is deeply personal and at times heartbreaking, as it recounts the author's teenage years. She was bullied at school and suffered from anorexia; later, her desire to be an actress was not taken seriously.  She also had her share of bad relationships with toxic boyfriends, longing for friends and unconditional love, yet knowing that her character, being unsure and self-doubting, was not easily leading to acceptance.   There was always a hole in her piggy bank, as she beautifully describes the process. Reading about it made Zosia Mamet very relatable: I just felt how hard it must have been for her to struggle. There are, of course, essays that bring a smile and laughter, thanks to the author's great sense of humor. Altogether, the book feels authentic, with the author opening up to the reader, showing her fears, and because, as she writes, "the truth of the matter is that pretty much everything I do in this life is finished with a question mark."

For me, this constant questioning is much more interesting than ending everything with a non-debatable period or an enthusiastic exclamation mark.

I really enjoyed Zosia Mamet in Girls and was excited to read her book. It was interesting to read about her childhood and her young adulthood and to find out more about her. She definitely dropped some tea on some not so good professional experiences she's had and some of her relationships sound like a disaster, so I'm glad she's doing better. I enjoyed it.

I enjoyed the experience of reading this book, and I'm giving it three stars for that reason, but quite a bit of the book felt like a missed opportunity. The experiences were there, but they didn't sing as much as they could have. The book was filled with the most overused cliches (popping pills like Tic Tacs, butterflies with crushed wings), and I think Mamet would've been helped by using a ghostwriter. Stories like having your coat stolen from you by Axl Rose should have more impact than they do here.

There's also some filler--I don't think tweezing an errant chin hair or squeezing a tube of toothpaste warranted a chapter each.

Zosia gives her funny, honest take on growing up as a B-level nepo baby with anxiety and disordered eating in the early 00s club scene. It did feel a bit unrelatable at times.

Thank you NetGalley for an arc of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I’ve always been told I am a Shoshanna, and now after reading this I know I am a Zosia too. Does This Make Me Funny? is filled with essays that are witty, funny, and surprisingly relatable. Zosia’s voice feels genuine, like you’re sitting with a friend who is telling you stories that make you laugh and nod along.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I don't think I was in the right mindset to read this. I was really curious to read something by Mamet after loving her for years as an actress, but just had a hard time relating to her in her essays, or really caring much about things I felt like I should've cared more about. I know this was likely a personal and intimate experience for her to write and I appreciate that, it just didn't fully land for me.

This is a beautily, funny, and heartbreaking collection of essays. I know Zosia Mamet from Girls, and it was great to hear her voice and get to know her. One of the essays is titled 'Wanna be my best friend?' and honestly, yes. After reading this it kind of feels like we already are? Reading Does This Make Me Funny? feels like sitting with a friend and listening to them tell you a story.

Let me start by saying I love Zosia Mamet, and I loved getting to know her through this collection. That being said, some of the essays felt like they were randomly placed in this collection with no real purpose or meaning. Other than that, Mamet's essays provided a look into her struggles with loneliness, her eating disorder, and general fame. I loved getting a peek into her brain and felt like I was hearing stories from a close friend through reading these essays.

Thanks to NetGalley & Viking for the ARC!

Zosia Mamet’s "Does This Make Me Funny?" is a lackadaisical collection of anecdotes in search of a purpose. It meets the uncertainty of its title with more insecurity, undermining the book’s themes before they have a chance to develop.

Whether or not it’s fair, it’s probably impossible to discuss any of Zosia Mamet’s work without addressing the nepo-phant in the room. Her privileged background shaped a lot of the discourse surrounding "Girls," and even if audiences have moved past the point of caring, Mamet hasn’t. She opens the book by acknowledging her status, but rather than exploring it with the same nuance as her co-star Allison Williams, she immediately dismisses the criticism by saying she never felt like she fit into her family. And also she fought her way to the top, “crawling” on “hands and knees.”

I’m not sure you can describe something as being “like trying to wrap your head around Anna Wintour doing manual labor” and still write for the masses.

As a millennial, I think we have a generational habit of admitting culpability to avoid accountability, and Mamet’s general reluctance to reflect falls right into that trap. She simply cares too much about what the reader thinks, so each “essay”sounds like it was written by someone who was always told they were the most interesting person in the room. As an example, “Cracked” opens with Mamet explaining that she accidentally smoked crack, and then we read the details about how she accidentally smoked crack, and then she tells us how it was ridiculous that she accidentally smoked crack because then the same thing happened on "Girls" when her character accidentally smoked crack.

Mamet writes about life happening to her instead of how she has lived, and that can only go so far.

The author is always just outside of the reader’s reach, obscuring herself behind palatable life lessons like, *they say don’t meet your heroes, but sometimes you should.* Even when Mamet shares some pretty horrific, misogynistic trauma, it feels like self-flagellation because it’s included only to make a toothlessly broad point about the patriarchy, like *women’s bodies aren’t respected in healthcare.*

This is an important truth, but not at the expense of the woman writing it.

Unfortunately, Mamet reserves her most honest revelation for an epilogue, and it’s one that made me want to read more: she desperately wants to be more famous. She knows she’s not supposed to say that, but it’s meaningful in its crassness. Great personal writing wrestles with the dissonance between reality and how we interpret it, and Mamet starts to do so in the final pages. What does it mean when everything is mediated through performance? What does it mean to be a person when one’s sense of self is defined by how others respond?

These are questions that Zosia Mamet seems to actively reflect on, and I hope she expands them into a full-fledged book at some point. For now, though, I’ll answer "Does This Make Me Funny?"’s titular question with a simple response:

No, not really.

I love Zosia Mamet and it was fun to learn more about her as a person, because turns out she is *not* Shoshanna. Some essays are much stronger than others. The essays I enjoyed most were the ones that went deep — Mamet talks about her struggles with anxiety, an eating disorder, being a young adult finding herself in wild situations in NYC. These essays really were earnest and honest and that is the pocket where I feel like she shines as a writer. There were some essays where it felt like the humor was forced, which I didn't think was necessary because in just her normal way of telling a story, I find her humor to come through without trying. Overall it was an enjoyable read, and I do feel like I walked away learning more about her as a woman, understanding more of her background and struggles, and appreciating her takes on life.

A funny, emotional memoir-in-essays by Zosia Mamet, best known for her work on HBO's "Girls." Her tone is brisk but never too fast and does an efficient job sharing anecdotes about time in Hollywood and elsewhere and her growth as an individual.

In the introduction to Does This Make Me Funny?, Zosia Mamet tackles the “nepo baby” label head-on, insisting she doesn’t see herself as one and that she’s worked hard for her success. While it’s clear she’s trying to engage with a cultural conversation, the point feels overemphasized and doesn’t acknowledge that both things can be true at once: she may have had access through familial connections that others did not while also working hard to carve her own path. One truth doesn’t cancel out the other. It left me wishing she had trusted her perspective more—rather than starting on the defensive, simply letting her stories speak for themselves.

When Mamet does lean into storytelling, her voice shines. Essays on relationships with addicts, struggles with body image, and reflections on her most memorable role, Shoshanna, carry both humor and poignancy. These glimpses remind the reader why she’s an insightful performer and writer, willing to share her perspective with honesty.

Interestingly, she also contrasts herself in a point-by-point comparsions to Shoshanna from Girls, listing all the ways they are different, but I would've loved to dive into this more as at times, Mamet's childhood persona seems like where Shoshanna could have started. Going into a path where she became Mamet but could've been Shoshanna could've been fascinating!

While the collection didn’t entirely land for me, readers who are fans of Mamet’s work or who enjoy celebrity essay collections will still find moments of wit and candor worth the read and I certainly found enjoyable parts myself.

I was a big fan of "Girls" and I got excited to see that Zosia Mamet put out a series of essays/memoir-esque book. The stories were self reflective and highlight Mamet's experience being a nepo-baby lite. Her stories are a mix of sad and self-reflective with humor sprinkled in. "Girls" fans that are looking for an update on Mamet will enjoy the read.

Thanks for the advanced reader copy PENGUIN GROUP Viking Penguin | Viking & Netgalley.

I will admit that I’ve never seen anything Zosia Mamet has been in besides Girls, and I’ve never read anything she’s written previously. I found her character in Girls to be kind of frantic and too much for a good portion of the show, and I find it interesting she takes the time in this book to say that she’s nothing like Shoshanna from Girls, because half the time these stories feel like Shoshanna would be telling them.

I’m sure Mamet thinks her “nepo baby lite” comment, as well as her repeated insistences that she had to just claw and scratch for everything she was given, come off as tough and self-deprecating and funny. However, when she spends time discussing all her famous relatives, tells the story of how she got an agent (her dad just told someone to start representing her), and how she spent so much time as a kid on sets and therefore knew how the ins and outs already before she started her career…the assertions that things were so much harder for her than someone who didn’t count two playwrights, an actress, and the president of Julliard in their family just doesn’t ring true.

The same goes for some of the stories in this book. Mamet’s stories about her childhood and teenage years seem…off, and contradictory, and the story about her real life mirroring an exact storyline from Girls seems way, way too coincidental to be true.

That being said, Mamet absolutely shines when she tells stories about her adult life. Stories about bad relationships, depression, body dysmorphia, and her husband are all raw and almost compulsively readable. If the whole book consisted of these stories, this review would be a glowing one, instead of just so-so.

2.5/5 rounded up. Huge fan of Zosia’s acting career but this book wasn’t really for me. Her stories were fine, but it was written like a blog post. It didn’t seem well-edited and likely could’ve used a ghostwriter if there wasn’t one assigned. I could definitely hear the conversational tone of the words but it gave too much detail in some parts and skipped over large amounts of detail in others. All in all it felt a bit rushed in writing & editing.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I am a huge fan of Zosia and it was such a delight to read her book and learn more about her, her experiences in Hollywood, and the challenges she’s had faced. She is raw and authentic and completely loveable - highly recommend this book!

Such a tender, entertaining froup of essays. I love Zosia and her voice really comes through in her writing.

I had an idea of how the other three women of GIRLS were similar and different to their character, but I didn’t know anything about Zosia. It was fascinating to get to know the woman behind Shoshanna.

She’s an excellent writer; Descriptive, profound, and engaging. I think the essays about her childhood were fine, but the book really starts to leave a mark as she talks about her experiences with men, her career, and her struggles with anorexia. Getting to know more about Zosia was a lovely experience. She says in the beginning that she hoped some people reading the essays would feel less alone, and I think they will. The stories in these essays are relatable, devastating, and funny, sometimes all in the same essay. The titles of each essay are also fantastic and really set the tone of the collection. Zosia’s writing is witty, poetic, and visceral. This was a fast read for me, but at the end I felt spiritually nourished, as corny as that may sound. So, I am giving the book 5 stars!

I would definitely recommend checking out this collection, whether you’re a GIRLS fan or not. I’m excited to hopefully read more of Zosia’s writing in the future, and I’m going to check out that show she’s on with Stephanie Hsu that everyone says is fantastic.

I adored Zosia’s collection of essays about her personal life. Reading about famous families’ interests is fascinating, and Zosia’s account didn’t disappoint. The storytelling is effortless, and it feels easy to digest her words. This is a book that I would give as a gift to a close friend. Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC.

I read this book mostly out of curiosity—having watched Girls and heard snippets about Zosia Mamet and her family, I was eager to learn more about her story. I’m so glad I did, because I ended up connecting with her in ways I never anticipated. The book is filled with honest, vivid storytelling that brings both her small, joyful moments and the raw, vulnerable ones to life. It felt like sitting down with a friend, her writing style was real & witty.

What surprised me most was how “seen” I felt while reading. Even though Zosia’s life and circumstances are unbelievably different from mine, I recognized so much of myself in her experiences. I usually read collections of essays slowly, reading one here and there as a break from whatever fiction I’m reading, but I related to her so much that I had a hard time putting it down.

Thank you to Penguin Group Viking and Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. This book made me adore Mamet and I’ll be keeping an eye out for anything she writes in the future.