A boy being lonely and a girl being lonely emanates vastly different experiences. I couldn't relate to any of the writing. Maybe if you're a girl you'll like it better. But for me, 80% of the book went completely over my head. ( )

Never heard of her before but I'm glad I gave it a listen! ( )

Beautifully written and sitting somewhere between memoir and self-help, which may turn some people off, but not to fear: there's no checklists or journaling exercises here, just some heartfelt messages from an author who wants her readers to love themselves.

This is what it's like to fumble your way through adulthood when you spent your childhood with dysfunctional, broken people who hurt you and blamed you for making them hurt you. Even when everything looks like you've got it all together and you can't help but think that if you were really that special, or even basically acceptable, your own parents would have liked you--right?--so you must just have fooled everyone.

In one section she talks about the self-help industry's obsession with telling traumatized people to stop blaming their abusive parents for abusing them; it was spot on and reminded me of my own review of one such book. The parts about seeking out unsafe partners and situations because they were familiar? Yep. The parts about having a broken fear response because you've already been through terrible things that somehow didn't kill you? Yep. The parts about not knowing how to remove yourself from an unsafe situation because honestly that's never been an option before and you hadn't even considered it? Yep.

It's hard to tell for me, having skimmed a bunch of the reviews, how many readers and reviewers are coming from a similar background. Maybe a few? Normally I focus on the negative reviews because that's how I learn quickly about whether or not I'll like something: for example, if there's a lot of 1 or 2 star reviews complaining that the book is obviously part of a SJW plot to destroy natural, god-given sex or race hierarchies, I know I'm going to love that book. You can learn a lot about a story by noting what people consistently complain about in it.

Here what I mostly see in the negative reviews, is a lot of people justifying Lane's fears about being honest about the burdens of this kind of childhood abuse, by being awful and derogatory not about the book, but about the author. It's the stigma and shame in action that keep most people from sharing these stories in action. It's really sad. ( )

A series of essays about Moore's life and the trauma she experienced growing up in an abusive family, then experiencing other abusive relationships and encounters.

From the title, I had expected something more like essays on a theme, whereas this book turned out to be more just a regular memoir, albeit with themes of loneliness and longing running through it. Moore's style is caustic, bitter, and authentic, and certain parts of it resonated strongly with me. On the other hand, Moore occasionally comes across as dismissive of people who may have experienced different sorts of trauma than she. I'd hesitate to recommend this, because I think Moore's narrative voice is not going to be for everyone. If you're intrigued, maybe read the first chapter and see if you like it. ( )

I gave this one a good shot, but the author's style really didn't appeal to me. Unfinished. ( )