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I was in your camp. I heard so many good reviews but the book just seemed to drag on through the author's personal grief process. I did appreciate learning about what it was like living within two cultures. But overall, I didn't find this to be a great book.

I am having a hard time with this book. I'm about a quarter way through and bored by it. Food, food, food...ok, already! The reviews are so positive that I'll stick with it.

Same! Thanks for sharing your honest review. I’m a bit bored by the book and I’m only a third of the way through.

I struggled to finish this. I, too was disappointed, and I’m perplexed by all the great reviews. Mother-daughter angst (pretty standard in your teenage years), and watching your mother slowly leave this world (also not original).

Same! Based on all the great reviews, I was hoping to love it and was so surprised when I didn’t. And then I felt awful for being bored by someone’s memoir of their mom dying.

I’m 1/4 way through and not sure I will finish. I love the food and cultural info. What is boring is that there’s very little story and most of it is told, not shown.

I’m about 1/4 of the way in now, and I’ll probably finish, but I’m dragging through. It’s super boring so far and I’m not loving the writing style. I’m getting annoyed by all the lists and food descriptions. Just not my cup of tea and I feel like I’ve read this story before a million times.

This is my struggle as well. I feel so guilty for being bored while reading this. I’m pushing through.

Totally agree with all the bad reviews- it was nothing special at all. I may have liked it a little bit more if I read instead of listened to it. The author’s tone was terrible to listen to.

Same here. Really struggled to finish this one. It was just a sad story filled with a lot of food info. I really couldn't relate with Michelle.

I’m glad I’m not alone.

Soooo happy I’m not alone! I was excited to read this because of the reviews but I’m about half way through and really struggling to get through it

Really struggled to finish. The story seemed more about food than the relationship with mom.

I agree. I was not crazy about this book. I found it hard to be sympathetic to Michelle. Maybe reading it would have made a difference. The reader of the audiobook seemed out of breath and hesitated frequently.

I gave up on this one too! Why is her story so different from other Asian American immigrants that it deserves a memoir? And all the food descriptions got tiring really fast. It just wasn’t for me.

Really struggled to finished this one. I’m glad I’m not alone.

I agree with you,. I was very disappointed..

Totally agree! It's well-written, but reads like a poem

I agree with you. I've been on the wait list with my library for months to receive this book and was expecting more. It was well-written and very personal, but did not stand out as anything terribly unique.

I am almost finished with it, and think it is really boring. The only reason that I am not dropping it, is because it got such great reviews, and I kept waiting for it to get good.

I'm 3/4 of the way through listening to it and underwhelmed. I'm not sure if a different narrator would have improved things or not. I am finding it rather dry. The relationship between Michelle and her mother was very complicated. I didn't think the relationship was healthy.

I didn't like it either. It's a best seller which is how it ended up on my tbr pile but overall I waited months for a disappointment. Also I'm still reeling from the fact that he mom told her she had an abortion after her because she was such an awful child! Just wow, major disfunction right there. I cannot even.

I was thinking what to say about this book, but then read your review and you say it all.

This is one I wonder why I finished. Habit, I guess. Anyway, agreed.

This. I never finished 😐

I am tired of all the detail on the food! Plot needs more action or something...and usually I really like memories.

Now that I have finished, I've decided I like this after all. I criticized all the food detail, well, that's really the point of the book, the bonding over food and learning culture through its cuisine. It started slow but became very powerful midway. Anyone who has watched a parent suffer like this will relate to her story

I completely agree. I just finished it and I felt the same way.

I completely agree. I do not understand the praise for this memoir at all.

I just finished this book. Definitely underwhelmed and got pretty bored with all the food connections to emotions.

I agree. I didn't even finish the last few pages. Mostly I just don't like her writing style/prose.

DNF after 77 pages

I really expected and wanted to like this book. I didn’t mind the food references at all but I felt like the author focused too
much on herself (which I supposed is the point of a memoir) but I thought her motives were to assuage all the guilt she experienced over her relationship with her mother. It was too self centered in a way that put me off. I found it boring after awhile and didn’t finish the book. Perhaps I will go back to it. A much better book on a similar topic is Tastes Like War by Grace M. Cho.

Completely agree. I finished the book by skimming over the food descriptions but didn’t impress.

Felt the same way. I did the audible version and kept fast forwarding especially with all the cooking just to get through it. She was abused by her mother and father. This book felt like her need to come to terms with that and put it in writing. Maybe a journal would have been a better choice.

Oddly, I felt the same way. I wanted to love it.

Your review says it all

I just put it away because I’m annoyed by it tbh

I read about 1/3 of the book and put it down. Mom presents as a narcissist, and the bond she and her daughter share seems forged out of the mother’s need to control and the daughter’s need to be accepted by her. A bit painful to read.

I felt the same underwhelming feeling I got very bored by the middle of the book I didn’t mind the food description but I found the story to be boring .. it’s not worth writing a book about it I’m well aware of the hard loss she’s been through but overall wasn’t something special tbh

Same. Wanted to love it, got up to chapter 10 and DNF.

I'm so glad to know I'm not alone! I struggled through this book. I kept looking to see how much further I had to go to get it over with. Thanks to all of you for voicing what I was thinking!

I can’t believe how high this book is rated. Do people just think they SHOULD like it because of its cultural content? To me the author seemed narcissistic - so focused on herself and written as if she’s the only human who ever suffered the loss of a loved one. The way she describes her mother in the beginning seems like she has lots of negative feelings toward her. Then the whole rest of book just dwells on her mother as if she’s the most amazing person ever. It seemed like an unhealthy relationship and nothing was learned by Zauner’s experience. I regret spending the time to finish it as it did not seem like the author grew or changed during the entire account.

I agree with many of the sentiments here. What I anticipated would be a quick and enlightening read, was a laborious and off-putting waste of my time. I read this for a bookclub and my perspective is that it’s 239 pages of aimless grief, regrets, disdain, illness, and death sprinkled with many unnecessary food descriptions and sporadic mentions of a significant other. It serves as proof anyone can write a published and hyped book given this one reads as a rambling diary with cringeworthy levels of TMI (a grandmother that thinks it funny/acceptable to jab her finger into the bottoms of her grandchildren—prompting the author to cover her’s with her hands to avoid discomfort, for example). What was the point of this book? It seems to exploit a mother’s pain, suffering, and death as well as leverage grief/loss to boost the author’s music career. Bizarre

I agree. Love what Diane Wiesenborn wrote here in your comments too. Glad I finally read it but won't be recommending. I know we are in the minority so it's helpful to have the camaraderie. :-) I just posted my review after finishing it. Thanks for yours.

Not enjoying it at all, but I aim to finish it. The person narrating is very boring and monotone.

It's okay, guys, not every book is palatable for every reader :)

Really didn’t like it. It started off good, but by the middle, it just became tedious. The food sounded delicious, though!

Bigtreble wrote: "Really didn’t like it. It started off good, but by the middle, it just became tedious. The food sounded delicious, though!"

I totally agree!! Tedious is a great word to describe the reading process. But, the food did sound really great!!

Angie wrote: "Not enjoying it at all, but I aim to finish it. The person narrating is very boring and monotone."

I totally agree! I wanted to finish it just to finish it, but there was no real emotional pull or interest on my part.