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Sure, I'll Join Your Cult: A Memoir of Mental Illness and the Quest to Belong Anywhere
From "weird, scary, ingenious" (The New York Times) stand-up comedian Maria Bamford, an instant New York Times bestselling, brutally honest, and "laugh-out-loud funny" (Jennette McCurdy, #1 New York Times bestselling author) memoir about show business, mental health, and the comfort of rigid belief systems--from Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People, to Richard Simmons, to 12-step programs. Maria Bamford is a comedian's comedian (an outsider among outsiders) and has forever fought to find a place to belong. From struggling with an eating disorder as a child of the 1980s, to navigating a career in the arts (and medical debt and psychiatric institutionalization), she has tried just about every method possible to not only be a part of the world, but to want to be a part of it. In Bamford's "trademark blend of disarming intimacy and dark whimsy" (Publishers Weekly), Sure, I'll Join Your Cultbrings us on a quest to participate in something. With sincerity and transparency, she recounts every anonymous fellowship she has joined (including but not limited to: Debtors Anonymous, Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous, and Overeaters Anonymous), every hypomanic episode (from worrying about selling out under capitalism to enforcing union rules on her Netflix TV show set to protect her health), and every easy 1-to-3-step recipe for fudge in between. Packed with "Bamford's brilliance, relentless humor, and insatiable instinct for survival (Library Journal), this memoir explores what it means to keep going, and to be a member of society (or any group she's invited to) despite not being very good at it. In turn, she hopes to transform isolating experiences into comedy that will make you feel less alone (without turning into a cult following).
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Community Reviews
Maria Bamford's insight into her own mental illness is heartfelt and funny. There are a lot of laugh out loud moments in this memoir. I like how she finds the humor in some of life's darkest moments.
Unpopular opinion but I did not like this book. I understand Maria is a comedian and an eccentric but listening to this audiobook was obnoxious, immature, and neverending.
Bamford narrates the novel and does many different voices and characters that shows off her talent in voice acting cartoon characters, but doesn’t do much in the terms of literary narration. Her voice just grated on my nerves and I didn’t find her humor funny or even entertaining, it was just annoying. The audiobook also has this gimmick of playing a mixing bowl sound at the start of each chapter to math her recipe theme and it was jarring to the say the least.
The flow of this book was also non existent, I finished it and honestly can’t tell you what it’s about beyond her mental struggles and her mother. I wouldn’t recommend this book to literally anyone, and I honestly don’t know why it’s being marketed like it’s groundbreaking because it’s not.
If you’re a big fan of Maria Bamford I could see you loving this book, but as someone that’s only vaguely familiar with her I see no reason to pick it up and wish I’d just DNF’d like I originally planned
Maria Bamford's honest and bashful honest approach to her life and her mental health bring a comfortable awareness nd light to these struggles that everyday people face. I liked how she explained how her brutal honesty to her life and its ups and downs had me roaring and yet feeling like these should be more approachable table conversations. I liked how she uses her comedy to show how important these mental health care issues should be accessible to everyone and the differences they have made in her life. She's a great comedian and a relentless advocate for all.
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