I'm Glad My Mom Died

A poignant, vulnerable, candid, brutally honest, and emotional memoir.

Having grown up never watching Nickelodeon or really knowing anything about Jennette, I wasn't all too compelled to read this, but I couldn't help picking it up after hearing so many people rave about it. I couldn't put it down.

This isn't a fun or hilarious read as so many other reviews seem to suggest, but Jennette tells her story with dry and candid humour which is clearly used as a coping mechanism and is a testament to her ability as a writer to divulge intimate, traumatic experiences in a digestible and engaging way without it feeling dramatised. While I felt that a lot of details were glossed over (for instance, the large gaps in time between some of the chapters), they obviously weren't crucial to the narrative and her succinct, organised writing style makes the book fast-paced and captivating. Jennette's ability to recount the most traumatic details of her life with wit and clarity in a matter-of-fact and deeply self-aware voice should be admired.

It would have been nice to see a bit more insight and reflection, particularly toward the end of the book. At times it felt like a retelling of events that happened with little detail into how these things shaped Jennette, how she feels about them now, and what she has learned from them. That being said, the style in which the book was written didn't really allow for much reflection and it wasn't the purpose of this story. Overall a really gripping and fast-paced memoir.