22 Oct / Bring Your Baggage and Don’t Pack Light: Essays by Helen Ellis [in Booklist]
*STARRED REVIEW
Rare is the audiobook that remains infectiously delightful through the ending credits, but Helen Ellis won’t disappoint with the 13 essays – her acknowledgements could almost qualify for a 14th, they’re that entertaining – of her second collection. Her beloved husband of 25 years names her charm as her “Helen shtick”: “You know, acting out stories, being overly polite, shocking people with the nice way you look and then with the naughty things you say.” “And my southern accent don’t hurt none,” she adds.
Indeed, stuck-in-your-ears Ellis is that invisible friend on a solo walk, never mind she might get you funny looks while you’re guffawing way too loudly in public.
In “Grown-Ass Ladies Gone Mild,” she’s repeated the Raging Rapids ride at a Redneck Riviera water park 28 times and relies on her “lifetime of adolescent humor” to get through a bff’s cancer diagnosis. She eschews texting. She’ll tell you who makes the best seat mates. She talks other people’s sex habits, cat ladies (women ravaged by too much plastic surgery—“Is Botox the new back-alley abortion?”), never being the worst poker player at the table, menopause, gravity-addled necks, and more.
The only complaint – at just three hours, it’s too short!
Review: “Media,” Booklist, October 1, 2021
Readers: Adult
Published: 2021