By Wendi Aarons
Published November 2022
256 Pages
7 hours 7 minutes
In my foray into audiobooks, I decided to try something that wasn’t straight informational non-fiction, but I already have access to most of the fiction books I want to read and I’m not quite ready to jump into an Audible subscription (how many subscriptions can one person possibly maintain?) So I turned to memoir, preferably humorous memoir, and landed on this one. I’m a Gen Xer, roughly the same age as the author with kids roughly the same age, so I figured this would be an enjoyable choice. And who doesn’t want to arrive at work in a good mood after listening during the commute in?
The problem became almost immediately apparent: I didn’t find the author’s brand of humor funny. I chuckled along at the brief mention of Bunko, sympathized at the horror of trying to fit into a neighborhood mom group that doesn’t click for you, the dismissal of menopause by the male population (it’s real and it’s ugly), and often just feeling like a fish out of water. But that’s about all I got out of this book – one or two quick laughs and a few grimaces and head nods. It had a lot to do with the fact that the author and I have wildly different worldviews and things we place importance on. I could have enjoyed her point of view if she didn’t have to be quite so opinionated that the other side ought to be eliminated (seriously, I didn’t pick up this book to hear a political diatribe). I skipped part of that chapter.
No, what really wrecked this book for me was the author’s voice. I realize that the narrator of a memoir ought to be the author, but she sounds like she’s Gen Z, not Gen X. Her internal remarks came across as snarky/whiny, and I finished listening with the impression that she’s still insecure, possibly shallow, and the world is never going to live up to her expectations of how it ought to be.
I didn’t rate this lower than I did because I’m aware it might appeal to a lot of women and I did recommend it to a coworker’s daughter, but I cautioned she might want to read it rather than listen to the audiobook.
2/5 stars ⭐⭐
Thank you to NetGalley and Andrews McMeel Audio for providing the ARC audiobook. I’ve left my review honestly and voluntarily.
Until next time, thank you for visiting.
Ann Dudzinski 