Customer Reviews

And the Heart Says Whatever

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I picked up this book because interviews with Gould have been making the rounds, and she has some really interesting things to say about what's expected from women's confessionals/memoirs, and how their male counterparts are not held to the same standards. She has some thought-provoking views and a unique way of expressing herself.

Sadly, there's little evidence of that in her actual book.

"And the Heart Says Whatever" is moody, aimless, and pretty self-indulgent. There are flashes of insight or humor, but these are so few and far between they feel like they belong to a different, better book. This one has almost nothing to offer besides a fragmented portrait of the author's late-teenage-to-late-twenties ennui.

Here's the thing about memoirs: usually the good ones are written by people who have led fascinating or unique lives. So far, Gould doesn't seem to be one of these people. She moves to NYC after freshman year of college, works a variety of rent-paying jobs, and recovers from the slow dissolution of a six-year relationship. There are sporadic attempts to inject her open-ended anecdotes with gravitas ("We were just college kids," or "I wonder why I didn't crack like an egg on the sidewalk."), but it came off as, well, pretentious. Gould also seems to luxuriate in the idea of herself as a screw-up; not necessarily a Bad Girl but one who realizes the trap of being a Good one. While I applaud the sentiment (and the homage to Liz Phair), her adventures read less like owning her mistakes and more like, you know, stuff. Stuff that happens to everybody, like getting involved with someone when you're not right for each other, or getting a puppy before you're ready for the (huge!) responsibility. None of it's that big a deal.

I suppose much of this could be excused if the prose were anything other than pedestrian. There's nothing particularly atmospheric or captivating about Gould's writing. She lives in one of the most fascinating cities in the world, but all we see of it here is the inside of office buildings and cheap apartments. She writes her "characters" as if for a short story workshop, making them memorable by dint of piled-on metaphors and elaborate physical descriptions, but is seemingly uninterested in them as people with personal motivations. This isn't just true for the bit players, who wander into the narrative to progress the story as needed before wandering off, but for the major influences in Gould's life as well. Her best friend for years disappears in an eyeblink, and her ex-boyfriend, despite permeating Gould's thoughts throughout, is almost a nonentity. We know they were once happy, she says she done him wrong, he's in a band and he has tattoos. Even for 200 pages, that's slim pickings.

"And the Heart Says Whatever" isn't an awful or offensive book. It isn't much of anything, really. Gould spends some time talking about her time at a publishing house and her exposure to "writers" who were bankable for their notoriety rather than talent or something to actually say. I wonder if she's aware that, for all intents and purposes, she's become one of these herself.

The writing in this book was laughably bad. This book wasn't even that long and I felt it dragged on! Calling it self-indulgent is kind. I borrowed this from a friend and couldn't finish it. Don't buy this book unless you have money to burn. If you do have it to burn, give it to charity, not to this author. Boring, pointless, poorly written. Enough said.

Received a review copy of this book. Sadly the author has very little to say and not much in the way of how to say it. One reviewer's observation that this recounts a mid-twenties ennui just about summed it up. I'm surprised it has such great reviews as it really isn't a great example of the literary essay - check out Joan Didion's 'Slouching Towards Bethlehem' to see how it's done.The heart says 'whatever' as it has little else to say, apparently, in this series of essays about nothing....

I love reading memoirs. Unfortunately, I did not do any research about this book before buying it. I rarely review things on Amazon, but I feel very strongly about how much i dislike this book. Even though it is not long, I'm trying to force myself to finish it. I might just stop and donate it. Grammar errors, repetitive, annoying self-pity about her ex boyfriend...I am almost certain that the end is going to be equally lame, if I even decide to finish the last bit I have left. Do not buy this book, there are way better memoirs out there that are well-written and have much better content with more variety.

I'm in my early twenties, a big reader and a closet writer who dreams of an awesome writing job. I once had big dreams about New York and this memoir sounded right up my alley. Hell, Gould sounded like my lost sister. However, once I reached page 30, I realized this wasn't true.

I felt like Gould was trying way too hard to fit a very specific wannabe Sex and the City genre. Gould tried so hard to be this chick who's a little bit naughty, but it just came across as a total cliche. At one point she's a twenty-something waitress/hostess/bartender trying to survive in New York City. We've all heard that story. Another chapter is about her getting a dog too soon. We've all been there. Other chapters were sex and weed-filled for no point other than to seem "shocking."

Never does Gould seem like she's learned a lesson. She often says she's realized mistakes, but she never actually shows it. She constantly continues her bad habits. While there are some fun "I've been there" moments, Gould never comes to any sort of conclusion. It just ends and you're left wondering if she's grown up at all.

Some parts aren't so bad and I didn't dislike it while reading. It's not until you're mulling it over after you've finished that you suddenly wonder more about Gould. But maybe it was only ruined for me because I watched her discussion with Jimmy Kimmel on Larry King Live and found her incredibly annoying.

People under the age of 18 should read Emily Gould's book in order to find out exactly what type of person they should try NOT to become. The publishers, who really should know better, try to pass Gould's memoirs off as the rigorously honest self-reflections of a sophisticated hipster. But in truth they are simply the verbal brain farts of an excruciatingly vapid, deeply unimaginative mind. That the book was ever even considered for publication is an embarrassment to contemporary American letters. Emily Gould, you've had more than your 15 minutes. Now please just go away.

Do not waste your money on this book. Emily Gould should not be a professional writer. Trite writing. Poor plot development. Unfunny or interesting. I had the misfortune of having this book given to me by a publishing house friend as an example of what not to do. Of what the internet has done to our literature. People are now famous for being famous and nothing more. Ms. Gould proves this.

Even though I admit to not reading all of this book, I have browsed Miss Gould's various blogs (and boy, are there many) over the years and believe I am entitled to an opinion. Not sure how I first discovered her writing, probably by accident, but I have never read anything so self-indulgent. I guess I've stuck with it for so long because it's like a bad car crash, I can't look away. Even in this facebook, me generation world, it's shocking that someone is this self-obsessed. 'And The Heart Says Whatever' may be described as "heightened self-awareness", but I prefer to call Emily Gould's writing "extreme narcissism". The purpose of this review is to warn potential readers they will not find any sort of satisfying feeling, chuckling moment or relatability one usually gets from memoirs. Instead you will be bored, bored, bored with this girl's endless episodes of insecurity. A bit hypocritical for Emily to consider herself a feminist while sleeping around, and attempts to stamp out "slut shaming" just seem defensive. Is she not independent and strong enough to live her life without the attention of men? Why Emily continues to think her life is so fascinating is beyond me. Maybe people like me are to blame for giving this girl an audience, something you know she constantly craves and needs, as we've witnessed in her TMI sex stories. And I call her a girl because she is a bit immature if you ask me. Emily has certainly fooled herself into thinking she's important through her connections in New York and playing the fame game at Gawker, but if anything, this book is just a sad reflection of the world we live in, one that is all about "me, me, me!" but is really about nothing, which is also true of Emily's life. It is literally about nothing.

Emily Gould is a good writer. She conveys her melancholy and pessimism very well, leading us through her life of work, sex, and drugs (and tattoos!).

I'm a 64-year-old widow who never saw the show Sex and the City although I've heard about it in bits and pieces. The ironies in Gould's book abound. She writes about her mom and dad who at 26 were embarking on married life together and well on their way to the stereotypical two kids, a dog, and a station wagon and she at 26 is sitting on her ratty futon in a dilapidated apartment.

She remembers the break-up of her six-year relationship (her longest relationship) because it coincided with a time when she was contemplating her next tattoo. Her lover agrees that a certain tattoo would be a good addition and would add symmetry to her collection. Shortly thereafter they split!

I particularly enjoyed the story of her ill-fated encounter with pet parenthood and noted that she got rid of the dog and a guy at almost the same time and with nearly the same lack of emotion.

She recalls one of her early lovers whom she'd bedded just 13 times when she asked herself how people could maintain long-term relationships when she and her lover had nearly "exhausted the possibilities of the act."

She recalls the good times during her six-year-relationship--a typical night would be spent cooking and eating dinner, smoking a joint, and then falling asleep entwined in front of the TV. But she writes that the good times weren't meant to last. She betrayed her lover by kissing a coworker and wasn't able to retrieve the relationship.

At the end of the book she has a boyfriend, once again, but doubts whether she will ever marry and doubts whether love can last. She ends with a particularly depressing picture from a book in an occult bookstore which she just happens to peruse while attending the wedding reception of friends. Wow, and I thought my first boyfriend was avant-garde when he teased that if we ever married we could save a bundle by having the reception at White Castle (sixties version of McDonald's for those who don't know).

She is looking at the book while most of the guests and the bride and groom are at the other side of the bookstore enjoying pizza and beer. She decides to separate herself because she is having an anxiety attack. Believe me, I know all about those. I've been single, I've been married, and I've been widowed and anxiety attacks are equal opportunity to all stations in life, but it's telling that the book should end during such an anxious moment.

Want to be inspired, uplifted, or even just amused? Look elsewhere. But if you want an honest look at one young woman's sad experiences as a single girl in New York, read it and either identify or feel better about your own life. I couldn't help thinking about Judith Viorist's book Married is Better when she tells about the meaningless experiences she has as a young 20-something woman and how she doesn't miss those days even on the worst days of married life with a husband and three sons. Of course, this is not to say that it's not possible to have a meaningful life as a single woman. On the book jacket I noticed that a reviewer said in part "...a road map of what not to do."

I read this book in two hours during my exam week, when I really should have been working on my take-home finals. Something about it kept compelling me to turn the pages.

I fall into the right demographic for the book's likely expected audience. I'm a 21-year-old female college student, an aspiring writer, and a self-identified feminist who loves to think about others' internal lives to the point that it really defines my understanding of the world around me. From these details, you'd probably guess that part of the book's appeal to me comes from my identification with the author-narrator, or perhaps from my experience of her story as the glamorous vicarious realization of my own ambitions.

While I think you'd be right, I also think there's more to the book's appeal for me, and that the most strikingly wonderful aspects of her writing are bound up with the the almost painful self-consciousness that sometimes limits it. I risk being the bitchy girl in Emily's writing workshop here, but I'm going to offer some criticism with my praise.

She is really good at describing her states of mind, her experiences of other people, and the subtle, familiar shifts in her understanding of the world that constitute her becoming as a person. Of the last, her writing reminded me of that paragraph in the Blind Assassin where Atwood writes that moments of incredible courage or betrayal happen so quickly that we must have rehearsed them in the shadows of our mind, over and over again, and that we perform them as though stepping into "a remembered dance." I think Emily's writing makes these rehearsals visible.

However, she is not good at giving the reader a picture of the world outside of her mind. Every description gives the impression of something mediated, very self-consciously an element in her story-world, instead of a recording.

I read once that adolescence is like a dream. Her book gives the impression that her life is the same way: the experience of it trapped within herself, lit up by moments of almost-immediately frustrated insight into the outside world. This gives a claustrophobic feel to some of her writing.

I'm looking forward to the book that she writes when she can tell a story about something in addition to herself. I think it'll happen, and if this book is any indication, it'll be great.