My friends and I have a sapphic book club, and one of our number nominated Ten Steps to Nanette as our next book. Ultimately, we decided against it since not all of us had seen the titular comedy special. I watched it awhile ago, so I decided to read the memoir on my own. As like, a mini-book club within the book club, haha. Regardless, it got me reading, which got my mind blown.

As the title suggests, Ten Steps to Nanette chronicles the parts of Gadsby’s life that lent themselves to the Nanette show. Though the book is marketed as a memoir, it has the breadth of an autobiography (birth to present day). Gadsby’s writing has beautiful cadence—even without the audiobook, the words have a soothing rhythm. 

Very rightly, Gadsby insists the reader meet her memoir on her terms. For example, the ten steps aren’t in chronological order, but an order that makes sense to her. She brings in socio-political and colonial context to her story landscape, of which her child self didn’t know. Multiple times she implores people to not play “truth detective,” i.e. find the people she’s purposefully obscured. She focuses on elements that are important to her, when they’re important—not what’s sensational. If Ten Steps to Nanette had been one of the first memoirs I’d read, I’d have gotten into the genre much sooner. The sensationalism in memoirs like Running with Scissors don’t appeal to me.

Honestly, Ten Steps to Nanette made me question why I read memoirs. Gadsby’s life isn’t all peaches and roses, and I took breaks to rail against the toxic cocktail of capitalism, homophobia, and ableism that brought this book and some of its contents to my hands. Why should she have to do this, to share this? Yet I can’t deny that I’ve greatly benefited from Gadsby’s sharing. I have a viscerally better grip on autism and ADHD. My empathy has grown immensely, and I’m fired up to create art, to fight for justice; to love people better. I wish Gadsby well in the future. She’s more than earned her prime.

My review of Running With Scissors: https://app.thestorygraph.com/reviews/cb3f0e7c-79f9-4ba7-b543-31466ec1ddff