Erica’s Experience
Title: Quietly Hostile
Author: Samantha Irby
Genre: Essays/Memoir
Page Count: 304
Publication Date: May 16, 2023
Interested? Buy Quietly Hostile here
Review
I want to preface this post with a hard fact: I learned about Samantha Irby in March.
This review happened all thanks to a dear friend of mine who invited me to a Q&A at Loyola University featuring Sam. I am not one to turn down a book event, quite literally ever, so I was there in a heartbeat and bought her book, sight unseen.
Irby’s prose are the purest source of chaotic good I’ve read in a while. There’s nothing more refreshing than a woman so willing to speak candidly about her bowel movements. There’s also nothing more inspiring than someone who can laugh at their own anxieties. Irby celebrates crass humor in a nuanced way I can only respect. My internalized Catholic girl? Blushing. Constantly blushing.
A perfect example of this was Sam’s essay, “Body Horror!” I won’t go into detail to avoid ruining the essay for those who haven’t read the book, but just know the middle of this story falls on page 69 for a reason.
Don’t worry about there being any chronological order to the 18 essays within Quietly Hostile. They are as organized as the pile of junk mail currently sitting on my mantel. I highly recommend reading this book from cover to cover (including the dedication to Zoloft). However, if your brain’s as lawless as mine, here are the five stories I would start with:
- “David Matthews’s Greatest Romantic Hits”
- “How to Look Cool in Front of Teens?”
- “Superfan!!!”
- “The Last Normal Day”
- “What If I Died Like Elvis”
I’m pretty convinced this book would make my mother swoon like a Jane Austen heroine after a long walk, but to my fellow millennial women who like people that tell it like it is—Quitely Hostile‘s the book for you. As a girl living in Chicago trying to achieve her dreams, I salute my former, fellow Chicagoan, Sam Irby. You did the dang thing!
You can purchase Quietly Hostile by Samantha Irby here.
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