Yay! I was a huge fan of Brosh’s blog, also title Hyperbole and a Half, in college. My friends and I loved reading her hilarious illustrated stories, and adopted the word “parp” as our catch-all greeting thanks to her story of trying to convince her mom to allow her to go to a party after dental surgery if she was able to run around the park, which she pronounced “parp” after waking from anesthesia. I purchased this book, which collects stories from her blog as well as some amount of new material I think, immediately after its publication in 2013, but as is my habit with anything where I’m already familiar with much of the content, I then struggled to muster enthusiasm to actually read it. ⁣
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Fast forward to last night, I finally picked up this book and read it cover to cover in one delighted sitting. Much of the book is devoted to lighthearted and hilarious stories of Brosh’s childhood antics, and her two dogs, but she also gets more serious with her self reflective discussions, for example of her uncomfortable suspicions that she’s not as good of a person as she’d like to believe, and her experiences with depression. The depression stories made me feel so seen, and I think would give folks without depression some ideas about how not to give advice. She creates this perfect metaphor where she’s upset that her fish are dead, and instead of anyone saying ‘wow that’s awful how dead your fish are’, they’re all giving her advice like ‘oh let me help you find your lost fish,’ ‘fish are always deadest before the dawn’, and ‘have you tried having them not be dead?’⁣⁣
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Nailing funny and insightful all at once, I definitely recommend this book, or her stuff is all still available on her blog if you want to give it a read! (Warning, do not attempt anywhere it would be inappropriate to laugh out loud!)