Rachel

Hilarious

Revisado: 11-21-24

For all of us girlies who miss Broad City!!! Amy Sedaris is completely hysterical in this. The mother you hate to love and love to hate…. Like a new age Lucille Bluth 😂 Zoe Chao and Esther Povitsky are great as well.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

esto le resultó útil a 5 personas

Great Brother and Sister Duo

Revisado: 06-06-24

Amazing performances all around -- especially loved the relationship between Jay and his twin sister Dara!!!

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

esto le resultó útil a 4 personas

This made me want to brew my own kombucha!

Revisado: 10-12-23

Duff is super relatable, and he made the world of kombucha feel really accessible. I learned so many cool facts. Thanks!

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

esto le resultó útil a 2 personas

Love the deep dive with true crime heavy hitters!

Revisado: 11-04-19

I never thought I would call myself a true crime fan, but with the age of prestige true crime upon us (whatever that means), I've surprised myself by getting immersed in narratives like Mindhunters, Serial, The Staircase, OJ: Made in America, Twisted, A Serial Killer's Daughter, and more. I love how this piece looks at where true crime is right now as a movement and asks really interesting questions about where it should go next. I'm super intrigued by the part of the conversation that talks about the mental health toll on true crime investigators and journalists. And check out that star-studded cast! Attica Locke is my new fave <3 I also loved hearing Scott Brick talk about what it was like to narrate In Cold Blood. Thank you for the thought-provoking listen, complete with creepy Americana-esque sound design!

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

esto le resultó útil a 25 personas

One of the most important voices on mental health

Revisado: 09-23-19

I was already really curious about this memoir when I saw two of my favorite writers—Kiese Laymon and Samantha Irby—say really nice things about it, including these phrases: “I want to scream my joy,” “momentous art object,” and “human miracle” (!). Bassey Ikpi is a poet who had a mental breakdown while touring the world with HBO’s Def Poetry Jam. During her hospitalization, she was diagnosed with bipolar II. As we become a little more woke about intersectionality in our culture, Ikpi’s voice as a black woman dealing with mental illness is arguably one of the most important voices you should put everything down for and just listen to already. She’s one of our most important mental health advocates, and I am here for it.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

It will open your heart if you let it.

Revisado: 09-23-19

I’ll be the first to admit I never thought I’d go near this one. As the mom of my own two toddlers, I didn’t think my heart could take a parent’s memoir about losing his two-year-old daughter after she was struck in the head by a falling brick. But then I saw that glowing blurb by Cheryl Strayed on the cover, and I braced myself because I knew I was going in.

Listening to Jayson Greene tell the story of grieving his daughter, Greta, is like walking through a fire and coming out the other side with more love, more compassion, and more understanding about the sacred things in life. It’s a very special listen that makes the scary stuff feel more okay. And it will open your heart if you let it ❤️

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

esto le resultó útil a 8 personas

Can you love a monster?

Revisado: 01-29-19

I've grown to love what memoirs can reveal about our shared humanity when the author is willing to dig deep. True crime, on the other hand, has always given me nightmares. Enter the true crime memoir. It turns out I love true crime memoirs! When super creepy, criminal acts are filtered through the very personal, introspective lens of a memoir, I can handle it. I can stop covering my eyes. I can peer a little more closely into the depths of humanity.

Kerri Rawson's astonishingly candid book about learning her beloved father had been leading a double life as a serial killer her entire life is the mother of all true crime memoirs. It touched me to my core. I'm all for the "complicated father-daughter-relationship" memoir, and it doesn't get any more complicated than "my dad is a serial killer." What I love about this book is how she fully explores the heart's confusion around knowing someone's a monster yet loving them anyway. She's so honest and pure in these moments, and her voice truly moved me.

I also really appreciated the thread of dark humor that she weaves into her story. Being able to laugh at your pain is such a hallmark of surviving crime, trauma, and abuse, and Kerri Rawson has all that in spades. Even in the darkest moments of her story, she tosses out unexpected one liners that endeared her to me even more. She's funny, and it turns out she's also a very talented writer and storyteller.

The first half of the book moves a bit slowly as she describes her family's life "pre-BTK," as in before anyone knew about her dad's double life. But this part of the story still has lots of payoff as it establishes the close relationship she had with her dad, as well as lays the foundations for her religious beliefs that would ultimately see her through her darkest hours. When she finally gets to "after-BTK" about halfway through the book, the story accelerates to lightning speeds, and I had to give myself a few little breaks only because it had gotten so intense.

Even though the cover puts this story squarely in the "true crime" camp, I hope this memoir will find a wide audience as I truly loved it and found it to be a deft and moving account of a life that most of us can hardly even begin to imagine.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

esto le resultó útil a 32 personas

Snackable History With a Pop Culture Twist

Revisado: 01-11-19

Jennifer Wright is SO completely entertaining and charming on the topic of plagues! She writes with scientific authority but also a strong personality infused with snarky humor and pop culture sensibilities.

There were sections on ice pick lobotomies that had me texting my friends with gross anecdotes that I couldn't possibly keep to myself. The section on Typhoid Mary was gripping and unbelievable. The author had a lot of fun with the buttoned up doctor named John Snow (yes, there were Game of Thrones references) whose discoveries helped stamp out a major cholera outbreak. Parts of the book read like a Sherlock Holmes novel — put on your deductive reasoning hats, kids!

Highly recommended for anyone who enjoys a romp in non-fiction, especially snackable history with a modern pop-culture twist.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

High School Is Weird for Teenage Girls

Revisado: 01-11-19

Look, high school is weird for teenage girls. No one understands the high drama of young women better than Megan Abbott, whose super dark crime stories explore what happens when ambition, jealousy, and competition start to consume female friendships. In the past, Abbott's murderesses have included cheerleaders and elite gymnasts, but this time she's outdone herself with a cutthroat lab of bloodthirsty scientists who will do anything to win a prestigious research grant. Narrator Chloe Cannon perfectly captures the persistent dread of being a young woman. I loved the undercurrent of feminist rage that hums just below the story's surface, almost as much as I loved listening to a murder mystery that doesn't have any dead girls in it.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

Do Believe the Hype

Revisado: 01-11-19

Poetry is having a moment, if you believe all the buzz in the book world. I approached this gorgeous collection (just look at that cover!) as a bit of a skeptic, more out of professional curiosity than as someone who actually expected to enjoy it. Fatimah Asghar has totally surprised me by sweeping me off my feet with her exquisite poems about pain, sweetness, and looking for somewhere--anywhere--to belong as a young Pakistani Muslim woman in America. As put by another writer I love, Kiese Laymon, we hardly even deserve poems this good (but we need them). In short: I guess I can get on board with this poetry thing, and and think my new morning ritual includes listening to 10 minutes of poetry on my way to work.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña