Broken (in the best possible way) – Jenny Lawson

Here’s what I personally love about Jenny Lawson: She is unafraid to write about the darkest side of anxiety, ADD without the H, depression, chronic diseases, and the absolutely horrifyingly CRAPPY health care system that denies people the care they need, with absurd rules and denials. She illustrates this in ways anyone can understand and find unacceptable. And then, from start to finish, she takes the ordinary stupid things that happen to her, maybe a little more than they happen to others, and makes them the funniest, laugh till you pee and cry books you have ever read. So you learn a lot and you laugh a lot and she’s such an incredible writer that you fly through the book in a sitting and buy the book you just read for free through Netgalley plus all her other books because you lost them and you imagine watching your adult kids read them in front of you. Jenny Lawson is that good! Broken (in the best possible way) was hard for her to write due to her mental health. Don’t forget ever that it is real and part of her and agonizing. If you don’t have depression, anxiety, or ADD, but someone you know or possibly love does, you can get into their heads a little by reading this book. And remember, too, that no one is just her illness. No one. Your socially anxious, isolating because of depression and introverted friend who is right now considering backing out of your holiday picnic may also be your funniest friend. Your most creative friend. Your friend who helps you see the world in a new way. Even broken pottery or rats in the backyard. And if she comes to the picnic, she’ll impulsively say something horrifying or unintelligible to your guests that is perfectly sensible to her and hysterically funny when she puts it in a book. Many of us want to be Jenny Lawson’s best friend, but she’s way too tired from getting through her day. So we must thank her for getting this book to us when she could and knocking it out of the park. Is every chapter engaging? No. A few fell flat. Is the book 100% one you should buy. HECK YEAH. The overall experience is a joyride and a deeply personal expose of the inside of Jenny Lawson’s head. Again. And if it takes eight or ten or twenty years for the next one, if I am on this earth, I’m in!