Michelle Reviews: The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl by Issa Rae

With a title like The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl one does expect a lot of social fumbling, but here’s the thing: I don’t think Issa Rae is as awkward as she thinks she is. Though maybe it is hard for me, a fellow awkward, to be an unbiased judge in this situation. I can however say with certainty that Issa Rae is very funny. I’ve been a fan of her web series, also titled The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl, for quite some time and was looking forward to this memoir to quell my epic sadness over the long term hiatus of the show. Rae talks about the awkwardness of adolescence (the most awkward of life’s stages) as well as navigating relationships socially, sexually, and racially – each with its own pitfalls. Rae can’t dance, she went through a cheating phase, and white people always want to touch her hair. It’s unfortunate; it’s awkward; it’s hilarious.

While the book is billed as a series of essays on being awkward and black, this book is really a memoir of a young woman navigating her early life in various and differing social climates. Issa Rae and I are the same age, and a big part of my enjoyment of her book came from exploring the similar elements of our cultural awareness as 90s kids. From A Different World to Aaliyah, I was on a wave of reminiscence. However, ABG is also about Issa Rae’s racial awareness, which is something that never occurred to me as a white kid growing up in the suburbs. Reflecting on the representation of race in pop culture in the 90s was surprising and saddening. How is it possible that in the age of technological expansion we have regressed so far in representation of minorities? Prime time television when I was a kid was full of racially diverse characters – where are they now? Why does it seem that everyone is forced to play to a stereotype? Or worse yet, to not be present at all.

Issa Rae moved from a majority white school in Maryland to a majority black school in Compton as a young teen. It was there that she learned to feel her difference. She didn’t listen to the same music as many of her peers, couldn’t dance, and generally fell outside of the cultural perception of blackness. Rae mines these years of teenage awkwardness to humorous effect, but much of the book seems to lead up to her revelation that she is just fine being awkward and black. Issa Rae doesn't have to be an Angry Black Woman; she doesn't need swagger; who cares if she is not a good dancer? It's great to be awkward. This cultural and stereotypical version of “blackness” that invalidates those who feel outside of society's definition is slipping as, in Rae's words, “our collective grasp of ‘blackness’ is becoming more and more elusive.”

Memoirs serve us best by creating awareness of a life lived by another, fostering empathy, and forcing us to realize the ties that bind us through collective experience. Rae’s memoir absolutely serves that purpose often with a self-deprecating joke or a tongue placed firmly in cheek. I laughed at Rae’s juvenile mishaps all the while mulling over a few of my own. Ultimately though, it is her success that makes this story. Issa Rae is not defined by her awkwardness or her race, she’s defined by her work. And that work, including this memoir, is pointed, hilarious, and a thrill to enjoy.

World Book Night: The Final Batch

When people suggest that memoirs should be written only by those who have lead wild, adventurous, or “interesting” lives, I say we point them in the direction of The Tender Bar. J.R. Moehringer is not a rock star or a mountain climber; he’s a writer, and really, those are the people who should be writing memoirs. Memoirists are writers who view the world (and thus their work) not through their characters but through memory and experience. Moehringer is not a special snowflake but he is a fine writer, and what he has written is a tale of the human condition. The joy in being just like everyone else, only better able to describe it, is that your stories are our stories. Moehringer’s search for love and acceptance, his youthful missteps, his triumphs and sorrows – they are all ours. It is through the detail of his life and his ability to extrapolate meaning from it that I am better able to understand my own life. The goal of memoirists, like that of novelists, is not to be interesting, it is to teach me who I am through their words, their story. Moehringer absolutely succeeds in that with The Tender Bar.

Walter Mosley’s Devil in a Blue Dress was the hard mystery on this year’s list. Just as I was basically uninterested in Michael Connelly’s Blood Work last year so I was here. But Mosley’s book has another angle as well. It is very much a novel about race. Easy Rawlins is an African-American man living in 1950s Los Angeles, who struggles to float under the radar in a system that will not allow a black man to do so. Easy is exploited by both organized crime and the police but suffers most in the end for “wanting to be white” in the words of his friend Mouse. The idea of that, and the implications of it, blew me away. Being white is floating under the radar. Being white is fitting in. Being white is easy (see what I did there). Easy Rawlins finds trouble by avoiding it, for the sake of the color of his skin. This is a great novel for discussion, and I can imagine WBN givers having some great talks about it.

Who would have thought I would love a book about baseball and math? No one. But I absolutely loved Michael Lewis’ Moneyball. Lewis is fantastic at explaining both of these worlds and building characters around them to anchor the information in a story. Moneyball is about fighting the irrational mind – specifically when it comes to baseball and the problem of creating a great team with a small budget. Lewis uses Billy Beane’s Oakland Athletics’ MLB team to get the reader (or at least this reader) thinking about problem solving outside of the accepted norms and what that really means. Such a great read especially paired with our recent book club book, Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow.

And that’s it, the last three of this year’s World Book Night picks. It is still only April, yet I already am filled with anticipation over next year’s crop. Again, I am pleased to have filled some major reading gaps with these thirty books and to have touched upon some authors/genres I never delve into. This (now annual) reading trek is a great tradition. I begin the year with a fabulously curated reading list that culminates in passing out free books to people – what could be better?

I have been sick these last two weeks and was unable to go out with the rest of book world on the 23^rd. I’m hoping to have a night this week to go out and throw books enthusiastically at people. I’ll let you know how it goes when I finally do.

PseudoReview: The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee by Sarah Silverman

I have discovered the joy that is audio books. The fact that I want to read just about every book ever is a mystery to no one, but sometimes I have to stop reading and, you know, do things. This time spent away from books has always been a sad time for me. Until I met audiobooks. Doing laundry has never been better!

It all started a few weeks ago when I finally decided to conquer my grandmother's flower beds. The beginning of spring meant lots of weeding and the removal of great amounts of fallen leaves...this would take hours. I decided that the best way to go about it would be with a book. In some ways, I am a lot like a puppy (mostly in that I am adorable, but also because I have a short attention span) so I worried that I may not be able to focus my full attention on a book while working in the yard. For this very reason I chose a book that I hoped would be entertaining but would not be difficult to fall mentally in and out of. I listened to comedian Sarah Silverman's memoir, The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage,Redemption, and Pee.

Silverman is a comedian that is famous for a certain kind of humor that can only be described as “potty humor.” But what made me want to read her book is the way in which she uses her grossout, controversial jokes. Silverman is a smart woman and a savvy comedian – she attempts to build a greater narrative surrounding her bits. Using juvenile humor she introduces her audience to the the idiocy of racism or explains what it is like to be gay (in that it is the same as being straight – all relationships are weird). To the late night Comedy Central audience (where Silverman's television show ran for three seasons) these ideas were not the norm but were embraced by way of Silverman's style.

The best parts of the book were definitely when Silverman wrote about her intent behind her jokes. Especially when they failed by being misinterpreted. She writes about being young and naive and learning on the fly. It is a good read for anyone feeling lost or outranked in their profession. This was an entertaining memoir and while it is ultimately forgettable (like all celebrity memoirs) I am glad that I listened to it, and it made yard work a lot funnier.

I never read memoirs by celebrities, apparently unless they are by female comedians, but these books make perfect listening – they are easy to dip into and out of as I have time to listen and the authors reading their own words only make them more engaging. I loved Bossypants by Tina Fey and Mindy Kaling's Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me is the next book I'll be picking up on audio. I look forward to so many more audio books. It is a decidedly different reading experience, and I'm getting to the type of books that usually get pushed to the end of my TBR list (especially memoirs and genre fiction). I'm reading more, I'm doing more, it's perfect.

World Book Night: Those I've Read

Another year another thirty World Book Night titles. There are a few things on this year's list that I may never have encountered in my life as a reader. I'm weirdly excited to read a Nora Roberts book; I don't know that I've ever read a straight forward romance novel before. John Grisham as well, he's got such a large back catalog that I would probably have never picked up one of his books (though why the WBN decision makers chose a football story instead of a law thriller is beyond me). Probably what made me chuckle the most though was seeing Looking for Alaska by John Green make the list. I wrote in one of my WBN posts on the blog last year that this was the one book that my teenage customers insist that I read (after The Hunger Games, of course). I'll also be rereading a few books I have not picked up since high school; one I loved (The Handmaid's Tale) and one I absolutely hated (My Antonia). Then there is this year's embarrassing admission: I have never read a novel by Mark Twain. Not a one. Yep.

I'll get there soon! Until then, here are the selections I've read in the past:

Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris was one of the books that got me through high school. While I was writing my own weird, sad essays, David's collection reminded me that there were other weirdos out there – many, including David, were weirder than me, and they were out there turning their awkward missteps into humor. David Sedaris' Me Talk Pretty One Day is hysterical, often outlandish, but always greatly entertaining. I can go back to these stories time and again for a laugh. A brilliant pick for World Book Night.

Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist is more of a fable than a novel. I read this just a few years ago, but the plot has not stuck with me. What did stick with me though is The Alchemist you will feel the warmth and hope its story provides.

the feeling it gave. It's a story of finding the path to your true self. This description doesn't really do the story justice. This is a book that betrays you with its simplicity. Long after you read

Norton Juster's The Phantom Tollbooth has been one of my favorite books since childhood. I was introduced to this novel in the fifth grade (also known as the single best reading year of my life) and have reread it a few times since. The Phantom Tollbooth is the story of Milo's journey to another world and like most fantasy novels he has adventures, battles, and learns lessons, but unlike other fantasy novels (unlike most other books you will read) this book and its author are in love with words. The cleverness of the text intrigued me as a child and still does today. Obviously, I am not alone in this as an annotated edition by Leonard Marcus was released 2011. Juster's words and Jules Feiffer's wonderful art must mean the world to more than just me.

One of my all time easiest handsells to reluctant readers has got to by The Lighting Thief by Rick Riordan. The plot of this novel, that the son of Posieden has been framed for stealing Zeus' lightning bolt, really sells itself. That coupled with the fast pace of the novel makes it a sure win for any kid who thinks reading is boring. I read the entire five book series over one weekend and enjoyed it all the way through. Riordan ties his books back in to The Iliad and The Odyssey, but never in a way that becomes overwhelming to a reader that may be unfamiliar with those stories.

I've written about Fahrenheit 451, Middle School, and Bossypants before.

Why I Want to Give Bossypants

Deciding which of the thirty World Book Night titles I wanted to hand out on April 23^th seemed much more difficult this year than last year. For one thing, last year's givers (myself included) were asked to suggest books for this year's batch. I made a few suggestions and one of them made it through. I'm sure many, many people suggested Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, it is THE BOOK about the importance of books after all, but I couldn't help but feel special. It was there for me to pass out on this holy Book Night, the night of the Bard's birth. This is the book that I credit with turning me into the reader I am today.

But then I noticed another book...Tina Fey's Bossypants. This book did not change me or make me think of my life in a new way. What it did though, was entertain me. I read Bossypants in a single sitting, laughing my way through an afternoon. Literature has many powers. Powers to inform, to enlighten, to change, as well as the equally noble power to entertain. Bossypants is a great book, maybe not capital 'G' great but great nonetheless, and that's why I'll be passing it out to parents in the pediatric care wing of Women's Hospital. I think that's just the kind of greatness those parents may need.

My original review of Bossypants can be found here.

World Book Night: The Final Batch

We've come to the end of the road. I made it through twenty-three of the thirty Wold Book Night picks. Couple that with the six I'd read in the past and we're up to twenty-nine with only one odd duck. I'm still making my way through The Stand and I can't picture myself finishing that one before I go out to distribute copies of A Prayer for Owen Meany tonight. Here are my reviews for the last of the books I have read:

Sherman Alexie's The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian is the story of a young boy trying to escape the cycle of poverty and alcoholism that is life on the Spokane Indian Reservation. This is such a fantastic book. It is funny and tragic and perfectly executed between the prose and the illustrations. The idea to tell the story in the form of Junior's diary was an inspired one; I don't know if this could have been a novel for young adults without the humor and levity that the format allows. This is such an important book and such a great book for younger readers. One of the many goals of art is to act as a mirror to society. The Absolutely True Diary functions as one of those mirrors. I encourage you to hold it up - you may not like all that you see.

Before I talk about Maya Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings I'll let you know why, it sings for the same reason that Sisyphus is happy. It sings because it must, because life is what it is and you get the most out of it through happiness and song. Angelou's memoir feels very reserved as though this is a memoir written by someone that does not relish talking about themselves. Maybe it is just that we are in the midst of an age of shock and awe memoirs, but the quiet reservation and doling out of secrets that Angelou's book contains made it feel all the more honest. This is a sad story but one about personal triumph; it is inspirational in the best sense of the word (especially, when Angelou talks about the power of literature).




The sense of deep longing that Jhumpa Lahiri's The Namesake encompasses is emotionally galvanizing. It is the story of Gogol Ganguli, a second generation Indian immigrant to the States, and the distance between his two cultures. It is very much so a novel about the difficulty of defining oneself, and Gogol's yearning is the force that propels it onward. It is a story that is peppered with loss, and it is moving and beautifully written. Definitely a good choice for World Book Night - I can imagine many passionate readers giving this one out tonight.



Q is for Quel Surpise. I was not looking forward to Q is for Quarry by Sue Grafton. I've already been through one gory mystery with this list and I did not want to force myself through another. But I read it anyway and it was good! I'm ashamed to admit that I thought all mysteries were the same prior to cracking the spine on this one. Q is not violent and it is much more about the characters than the mystery at its core. This is the seventeenth book in as twenty-six book series that Grafton has been able to sustain by creating compelling characters. I was definitely surprised to enjoy the book and I'll probably check in with Kinsey Milhone again sometime.

Review: A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson

Bill Bryson made a somewhat hasty decision to go for "A Walk in the Woods." He'd already committed to walking the Appalachian Trail (to friends and neighbors, to his publisher, etc) when he began to research the trail. By then he had to go through with it and (thankfully) write a book about it. Bryson is at his best in the beginning of the book when he is nervous and uncomfortable while traveling with his long lost friend, Katz. It's then that we get lines like this: "All the books tell you that if the grizzly comes for you, on no account should you run. This is the sort of advice you get from someone who is sitting at a keyboard when he gives it. Take it from me, if you are in an open space with no weapons and a grizzly comes for you, run. You may as well. If nothing else, it will give you something to do with the last seven seconds of your life."

I really like that side of Bryson, when he's funny and a bit sarcastic but not too snide. To me Bryson always feels like he is reveling in his discomfort - as though the draw to his books is more what he didn't enjoy about an experience than what he did. And that's totally great, as long as it's funny. It's when Bryson becomes too biting or complains too much that reading becomes a drain. Thankfully, that's relatively absent from most of this book. Instead we hear that, "there is nothing more agreeable, more pleasantly summery, than to stroll along railroad tracks in a new shirt." He seems to have genuinely enjoyed his time on the trail. To have really gotten something out of becoming a "mountain man."

I couldn't help but be a little proud and a little jealous. Hiking the trail is definitely not for me. I love nature. The beauty, the austerity, the solitude. But I'm terrified of it as well (as I am terrified of most things). At the height of his discomfort during one of his hikes Bryson begins to worry that he might die even as he knows that he is in a safe situation. He starts to worry about how much he's worrying. "Presumably, a confused person would be too addled to know that he was confused. Ergo, if you know that you are not confused then you are not confused. Unless, it suddenly occurred to me - and here was an arresting notion - unless persuading yourself that you are not confused is merely a cruel, early symptom of confusion." And that my friends would be my thought process in the woods, which is exactly why I would not survive.

I can't neglect to mention how much we learn from "A Walk in the Woods." Of course, this book is the story of Bryson's walk, but he also packs it full of interesting history about the trail itself as well as the Forest Service (who knew bureaucracy in the woods would be such a bad thing?) and the general failings of the American people and government when it comes to nature. Also, he's got an unhealthy interest in the people who have died on the trail, and if you thought I wasn't going to attempt this 2,200 mile hike before, well, imagine me now. I really enjoyed "A Walk in the Woods." The book is full of pitch-perfect trademark Bryson, and in the end I feel that I have "gained a profound respect for wilderness and nature and the benign dark power of the woods."

Review: Bossypants by Tina Fey

Reading Tina Fey’s “Bossypants” really felt like having a conversation with her. While that is awesome, the only problem was that it felt like she was having a conversation with,well, me. Instead of speaking to an intimate friend in whom she could reveal her most guarded beliefs and opinions. But then, this is my first celebrity memoir so I didn’t really have any expectations unless you count “oh my god, I love Tina Fey” as an expectation.

“Bossypants” is really less of a memoir and more a collection of remembrances by “an achievement-oriented, drug-free, adult virgin,” as Fey describes her younger self. You won’t find any essays on Fey as a feminist icon or any talk about her cultural relevance at all. What is laid out for you here in 275 pages is an expose on awkwardness. And Tina Fey owns it.

The book begins with a letter to the reader outlining reasons why you may be reading her book of which my favorite must be:

Maybe it’s seventy years in the future and you found this book in a stack of junk being used to block the entrance of an abandoned Starbucks that is now a feeding station for the alien militia.

I mean, that’s why I picked it up. After our letter we get an “Origin Story” and a love letter to her father, Don Fey, which features my favorite line in the book: “Don Fey is not going to put up with that. Don Fey is a grown-ass man! Black people find him stylish!” Basically, Don Fey sounds awesome and suspiciously a lot like Jack Donaghy.

As she enters her discussions of her time in improv and on SNL, we see Fey discuss a little about life in the boy’s club. She touches on her participation in the expansion of women’s roles on the show and behind the scenes, but mostly just to say that she was proud to have participated in the expansion of women’s roles on the show and behind the scenes. I would have liked to see a little more of her reaction to the changes, but I think the point she may have been making was to see for yourself. Tina Fey left the job of head writer at SNL to star in and produce her own show (30 Rock), obviously things went well – even if she does have a vagina.

Those who were looking for some kind of feminist manifesta and those looking for a celebrity tell-all will surely be disappointed in "Bossypants" but those of us who love Tina Fey's brand of self-deprecating humor will find plenty here to enjoy. I read it in one sitting then called my sister and husband to rehash my favorite bits. Like I said on Twitter, I agree with the Trees quoted on the jacket, "Totally worth it."