I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy
on August 9, 2022
Genres: Biography & Autobiography / Entertainment & Performing Arts, Biography & Autobiography / Personal Memoirs, Family & Relationships / Dysfunctional Families, Family & Relationships / General
Pages: 320
Format: Audiobook, Hardcover
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“I always forget that trying to reason with the unreasonable is… unreasonable.”
Jennette McCurdy was six years old when she had her first acting audition. Her mother’s dream was for her only daughter to become a star, and Jennette would do anything to make her mother happy. So she went along with what Mom called “calorie restriction,” eating little and weighing herself five times a day. She endured extensive at-home makeovers while Mom chided, “Your eyelashes are invisible, okay? You think Dakota Fanning doesn’t tint hers?” She was even showered by Mom until age sixteen while sharing her diaries, email, and all her income. In I’m Glad My Mom Died , Jennette recounts all this in unflinching detail—just as she chronicles what happens when the dream finally comes true. Cast in a new Nickelodeon series called iCarly , she is thrust into fame. Though Mom is ecstatic, emailing fan club moderators and getting on a first-name basis with the paparazzi (“Hi Gale!”), Jennette is riddled with anxiety, shame, and self-loathing, which manifest into eating disorders, addiction, and a series of unhealthy relationships. These issues only get worse when, soon after taking the lead in the iCarly spinoff Sam & Cat alongside Ariana Grande, her mother dies of cancer. Finally, after discovering therapy and quitting acting, Jennette embarks on recovery and decides for the first time in her life what she really wants.
This book stressed me out so much. I think it would be very triggering for people with eating disorders and people with abusive parents, as it is SO descriptive when it comes to these passages. It’s also a brand new look into celebrity, because most celebrity memoirs are written by people who are still in the business, but this is kind of a fuck-you memoir written by someone who doesn’t care if their bridges are burned, so she really unhauls all the dirt in a way that someone who probably wanted to keep working in this field wouldn’t. It’s really well-written but the writing can, at times, feel a bit amateurish. McCurdy has a lot of raw talent but the people hyping her up as brilliant are exaggerating a little.
I rated this book four stars. I can’t quite say I enjoyed it because it was actually quite depressing and you tend to dislike Jennette due to her fuck you attitude. Do read this book, if you are in a healthy mental space, but gird yourself against the hype. It is not Jesus’s Second Coming. It is just a very brave story about a woman trying to come clean with herself and the past.
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