The main character Gilda is all sorts of weird & I absolutely adored her. All of her approaches to things & the way the author details anxiety & depression is so accurate. Her hyper fixation with death & fear of death was something I found resonated with my inner child. I still struggle with & have fear around death, but I recall a period of time when I was a kid where I would be so terrified of those I love dying that I’d drive myself to panic. Gilda, as a 28 year old, is similar. Some may not enjoy this book & say that it’s too dark & depressing, but I think it just outwardly acknowledges we are all going to die someday. People don’t enjoy reckoning with that. Even with its dark undertones, I found it quite humorous.

I actually cackled at her random word spirals & the way she described her first mass at the Catholic Church. Having gone to a Catholic high school after having never gone to private school & not being Catholic, sO much resonated with me. Gilda’s curiosity about the world & thoughts questioning life, our future, & death felt so similar to a young child. I’m fact, a lot of the things she did &/or questioned, I remember doing as a kid. Her staring into the mirror to the point of not even knowing who she’s looking at anymore as well as questioning why opinions of those we don’t even know are so important to be valued, to name a few. It almost felt intimate & exposed to be reading this book. So many weird thoughts or experiences I’m sure many of us have had but don’t talk about that the author just plainly states in Gilda’s inner monologue. Overall, really enjoyed this book in all its oddity :)

*trigger warnings for various mentions of suicide

Resonant quotes
- “Sometimes I wonder if I have really been the same person my whole life. I stare at the picture, and think: Is that really me? I have this bizarre feeling like I was a different person at every other stage of my life. I feel so removed from myself then. Sometimes I feel like I was a different person a month ago. A day. Five minutes. Now.”
- On imposter syndrome: “I told her that I'm not sure that's a real syndrome. I said I wonder if everyone's an impostor. What if beneath every lawyer's suit and every stay-at-home-parent's apron, everyone is just a baby who doesn't know what they're doing? I wonder if anyone really identifies as the adult they've morphed into.”
- “My face looks strange. Is it the mirror? It is a sort of warped, vintage mirror. Maybe it's distorting my face. My eyes look enormous, and my mouth looks so small. Was my mouth always that small in comparison to my other features? Is that really my face? Am I looking at a painting? Who is that?”
- On entering new spaces & groups: “1 am inside of an ecosystem that I don't belong in. These people spend a significant amount of their lives together. They attend meet-ings, go for coffee, eat lunch. They are a community with relationships and shared objectives. It's strange that I am in this room. I feel like a foreign object inside of a body, waiting to be rejected.”