Misfit
Growing Up Awkward in the '80s
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4.5 • 22 Ratings
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- $14.99
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
“One of my favorite books of all time.” ―Amy Schumer
A tour de force of comedy and reflection about the perilous journey from kindergarten to twelfth grade and beyond―from the beloved stand-up comic and creator of The Great Depresh
For years, Gary Gulman had been the comedian’s comedian, acclaimed for his delight in language and his bracing honesty. But after two stints in a psych ward, he found himself back in his mother’s house in Boston—living in his childhood bedroom at age forty-six, as he struggled to regain his mental health.
That’s where Misfit begins. Then it goes way back.
This is no ordinary book about growing older and growing up. Gulman has an astonishing memory and takes the reader through every year of his childhood education, with obsessively detailed stories that are in turn alarming and riotously funny. We meet Gulman’s family, neighbors, teachers, heroes, and antagonists, and get to know the young comedian-in-the-making who is his own worst―and most persistent―enemy.
From failing to impress at grade school show-and-tell to literally fumbling at his first big football game―in settings that take us all the way from the local playground to the local mall, from Hebrew School to his best (and only) friend’s rec room, young Gary becomes a stand-in for everyone who grew up wondering if they would ever truly fit in. And that’s not all: the book is also chock-full of ‘80s nostalgia (Scented Markers, indifference to sunscreen, mall culture).
Misfit is a book that only Gary Gulman could have written: a brilliant, witty, poignant, laugh-until-your-face-hurts memoir that speaks directly to the awkward child in us all.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this winsome memoir, stand-up comedian Gulman (The Great Depresh) shares a self-deprecating account of his 1980s childhood, prompted by his move home as an adult. In 2017, Gulman left New York City for his mother's house in Massachusetts following a sharp decline in his mental health. Once there, he encountered copious reminders of his bygone school years, which he recounts chronologically—and with impressive sharpness—in the book's main chapters. Most of the anecdotes are hilarious, as when he's astonished on the first day of kindergarten after the school bus door opens to reveal that "the driver was nowhere near the door! What is this sorcery?" Others are sadder, as when he's forced to repeat first grade with a tyrannical teacher who bullies him and stifles his love of reading over a lost library book. Throughout, Gulman alternates his recollections with brief present-tense updates about the status of his adult depression. These can feel aimless and inconsequential beside the more vivid childhood sections, but they give the narrative shape and help Gulman pull off a moving conclusion. Funny and poignant, this will satisfy adrift adults looking to reconnect with their inner child.
