Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) by Mindy Kaling

Goodreads Summary:

Mindy Kaling has lived many lives: the obedient child of immigrant professionals, a timid chubster afraid of her own bike, a Ben Affleck–impersonating Off-Broadway performer and playwright, and, finally, a comedy writer and actress prone to starting fights with her friends and coworkers with the sentence “Can I just say one last thing about this, and then I swear I’ll shut up about it?”

Perhaps you want to know what Mindy thinks makes a great best friend (someone who will fill your prescription in the middle of the night), or what makes a great guy (one who is aware of all elderly people in any room at any time and acts accordingly), or what is the perfect amount of fame (so famous you can never get convicted of murder in a court of law), or how to maintain a trim figure (you will not find that information in these pages). If so, you’ve come to the right book, mostly!

In Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, Mindy invites readers on a tour of her life and her unscientific observations on romance, friendship, and Hollywood, with several conveniently placed stopping points for you to run errands and make phone calls. Mindy Kaling really is just a Girl Next Door—not so much literally anywhere in the continental United States, but definitely if you live in India or Sri Lanka.

My Thoughts:

I found the writing style good but at points times annoying. Which is really my impression of this entire book. Some of the recounts of Mindy's life were legitimately funny but honestly she doesn't know how to end a story in a way that maintains the funny. Often I would finish a story thinking, "huh, well that happened" and then I went back to reading homework instead of this book.

I think this genre of comics telling how they became funny is just a little over done and is becoming tired. I don't mean that as an attack on Mindy, she is sometimes funny. I just want something that isn't so formulaic. The funniest part of of Mindy's book is the honest part at the beginning where she talks about possible reasons people are reading her book. She says something about you have just finished Chelsea Handler's book so now what? If only this book was as good as any of Chelsea Handlers.

I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone unless they are a die hard fan of Mindy Kaling.

While writing this review I was listening to Aretha Franklin.