Jenny Lawson, AKA The Blogress, shares what it was like growing up in a highly function dysfunctional home in Texas. Her father, a Taxidermist likes to stuff all sorts of animals, never passes by a road kill he can not think of a use for as well as raise a few animals of their own…. like chickens…. and goats….
From the school days, to her 15 year marriage to her patient but continuously confused husband, Victor, Lets Pretend This Never Happened is told in witty “this is what happened” chapters.
I mainly listened to this because Jenny Lawson is a Blogger and that is “Whoop worthy”. Although I admit, I was not familiar with her blog, I am almost always up for something that makes me laugh and occasionally makes pop come out my nose. Seriously, who would pass that up? 😛
After seeing a couple of reviews on this one, I decided I wanted to go with the audio version because I thought the book would come across better and because Jenny Lawson (author) was narrating this herself and that is usually pretty cool or AWESOME with a capital A. Or both. Yes, in this case both.
Jenny Lawson is an Awesome with a capital “A” narrator. She really does bring each story to life with her “yes this really happened” attitude. I enjoyed her telling of each story and her over use of the word “Ya’ all”, which makes me want to use it when talking with friends and when writing reviews… I have to be careful not to do that for the next couple of weeks until this gets out of my head so tell me if you see me using it.
There is no question that Jenny is funny and I am a big fan of dry humor and funny scenario’s. Some of the early childhood stories involving dead animal flesh, extremities, and other levels of “YUCK” were not my favorites of the audio. When Jenny gets more into her discussions with her husband Victor, I think those where the chapters I enjoyed the most. Victor’s bewildered “Seriously, what were you thinking?” to Jenny’s “Oh, but this will work and we should definitely patent this idea before it is stolen” counter is at times HILARIOUS.
Some of my favorite book/audio moments are:
Post it note argument with Victor.
The GPS – why do they give street names? Land marks would be so much easier “Turn left at that blue house where you once seen that bum passed out in the ditch”
The taxidermy Alligator on the airplane, (I laughed several times out loud when Jenny gave the Alligator a voice with a thick accent and had it talking to a much embarrassed and annoyed Victor.)
There are a couple of chapters that are pretty real too, so it is not all fun and games, Jenny’s attempts to carry a baby to term are heart wrenching, and when she openly speaks on her illness as well.
While Amazon says this is a good one to read if you are fans of Tina Fey’s Bossy Pants, I would say that Jenny Lawson’s crude language is far more frequent than Tina Fey’s was and if you are considering listening to this on audio you are going to overdose on the “F” bomb as well as a few other words. Did the language go to a point that it bothered me personally? Yes. I do not read Jenny’s blog so I am sure this is just the way she rolls, which is fine, but for me personally, I think it could have been just as good and maybe even better without all the language.
Book Journey 