Literally Me
-
- $16.99
-
- $16.99
Publisher Description
LIVE. LAUGH. LOVE. or
EXIST. SMURK. LURK
Julie Houts has cultivated a devoted following as ‘Instagram’s favourite illustrator’ (Vogue) by lampooning the conflicting messages and images women consume and share with the world every day.
A collection of darkly comic illustrated essays, Literally Me chronicles the daily exploits of ‘slightly antisocial heroines’ (Refinery29) in vivid, excruciatingly funny detail, including:
• The beauty routine of a deranged bride who aspires to be ‘truly without flaws’ on her wedding day
• What happens when Kylie Jenner has an existential crisis and can no longer ‘step out’
• A journey to Coachella by the Four Horsewomen of the Apocalypse
• The true dating confessions of a fembot
• The terrifying description for Alice Staunch’s book How to be the Perfect Feminist
Literally Me marks the launch of a brilliant new social satirist. Julie’s singular voice and beautiful illustrations reveal the truth about the absurdity of life in the social media age: the line between becoming a total ‘Girlboss’ and a 21st-century American Psycho is razor-thin.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Houts skewers high fashion, the wedding-industrial complex, Instagram fame, and more in this caustic collection. Comprising illustrations, short prose fiction, and sequential art, all based on Houts's Instagram account, the book's focus runs the gamut: a story about the four horse-men of the apocalypse as young women attending Coachella and a chronicle of the long, slow death of a ficus tree in an upscale boutique bookend the volume. But it never feels scattershot rather, Houts finds the commonalities in the seemingly disparate subjects. This is truly funny work, but there is a darkness underneath; tales of a bride living off of "dust biscuits" to look perfect for her big day elicit laughter, but also highlight the impact of omnipresent images of female thinness on actual women. Houts's pithiness has earned her hundreds of thousands of Instagram followers, and it is on full display here.