You Should Read Jenny Lawson

BUY THIS NOW.

“Because you are defined not by life's imperfect moments, but by your reaction to them. And because there is joy in embracing - rather than running from - the utter absurdity of life.” 

― Jenny Lawson, Let's Pretend This Never Happened

When I wrote about all the books Becky and I were giving away at our wedding, I compared Chelsea Handler to David Sedaris.  For months now, I've intended to write all about the sexist literati who heap accolades on Sedaris while dismissing Handler as a vulgar TV star with some hit memoirs.  I put it off because my heart wasn't in it.  As promising a start as My Horizontal Life was, Are You There Vodka?  It's Me, Chelsea didn't measure up.  And I still haven't read Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang past that first tear-inducing (from laughs!) story.

My heart is behind Jenny Lawson.





How great is Let's Pretend This Never Happened?  Jenny Lawson is coming to Books & Books tomorrow at 6:30pm and I, who gets books thrown at him for free and has already read this in an ARC, am spending my hard-earned bookseller cash on not just one copy, but two (my parents are going to love it!).

Sedaris is aging out of his neurosis.  Doubtless this makes him a much happier man, but it don't exactly bring the giggles; he's had to work harder to make his daily life funny.  This leaves Lawson the Queen of offbeat, smart humor, and a bent perspective on life.  Reading Lawson is like spending time with a lovably crazy friend.  I laughed until I cried several times while reading Let's Pretend, and shared snippets and chapters with Becky so we could laugh together.

If you are free tomorrow (and you know you are; who the fuck makes plans at 6:30 on a Friday?), do yourself a favor and stop on by Books & Books in the Gables.  If you can't afford a copy, you'll at least laugh at what she has to say.

If you can't afford the gas money, she's been giving it away on the internet for years.  Here's The Bloggess on flying to New York to convince the could folks at Penguin to put Hamlet von Schnitzel on the cover of her book.

She also writes a column for Sexis she calls safe for work if your boss isn't an asshole.  Here she is on Japanese sex hotels.

If all that's too racy for you, she also writes about motherhood for the Houston Chronicle.

I've recommended her enough.  If you don't read her at this point, it's your loss.  Also, you hate fun.

“In rural Texas pretty much everyone has a gun cabinet. Unless they’re gay. Then they have gun armoirs.” ― Jenny Lawson, Let's Pretend This Never Happened