I think Samantha Irby and I could be friends, at least based on the essays in this book. Her frank style and realness is endearing and I felt truly understood by a person I don’t know. Wow, No Thank You is a collection of humor essays, and it is also a collection of truth. We’re really all so very tired, aren’t we? And isn’t everything we’re doing mostly exhausting and really we’d rather not be doing? Samantha Irby tells it like it is and delights us all with the tales of figuring out just how it is.
I listened to the audiobook and Samantha Irby offered the narration to her text. This was a gift. I take daily walks through the cemetery by my house and I would actually, no really, laugh out loud while listening to her book. I would hope she would appreciate this, me walking through the final resting place of so many, either laughing at their misfortune of being dead or reminding them of the joy of being alive.
There were chapters I listened to multiple times because they were so delightful. The chapter where Samantha answers letters that were sent to, presumably, an advice column of a magazine—though admittedly I may have missed that detail—is stunning and puts every letter writer in their place. I have been playing her turns-of-phrase around in my mind ever since. She has a way with words that is hilarious and thoughtful. Her writing rolls of her tongue as though it were conversational but at the same time you get the impression that you might not be smart enough to keep up in a conversation with her (in a good way). You want it to be a conversation, it reads smoothly like a conversation, but also every word is perfectly and carefully chosen and is a goddamn delight.
I highly recommend Wow, No Thank You to anyone interested in reading, writing, listening, comedy, other people, being alone, letters from strangers, television development, Michigan, Chicago, or just nouns in general.
