The New Yorker Best Books of 2023

NPR's Books We Love 2023

"A deeply honest and funny look at how exhausting it can be to live a human life, Unreliable Narrator is a book for anyone who wants to laugh and feel less alone." -- Amy Poehler

A hilarious and insightful collection of essays exploring impostor syndrome, from the inside and out, by the most successful fraud in comedy

Aparna Nancherla is a superstar comedian on the rise -- a darling of Netflix and Comedy Central's comedy special lineups, a headliner at comedy shows and music festivals, a frequenter of late night television and the subject of numerous profiles. She's also a successful actor who has written a barrage of thoughtful essays published by the likes of the New York Times. If you ask her, though, she's a total fraud. She'd hate to admit it, but no one does impostor syndrome quite like Aparna Nancherla.

UNRELIABLE NARRATOR is a collection of essays that uses Aparna's signature humor to illuminate an interior life, one constantly bossed around by her depression (whom she calls Brenda), laced with anxiety like a horror movie full of jump-scares, and plagued by an unrepenting love-hate relationship with her career as a painfully shy standup comedian. But luckily, crippling self-doubt comes with the gift of keen self-examination. These essays deliver hilarious and incredibly insightful meditations on body image, productivity culture, the ultra-meme-ability of mental health language, and who, exactly, gets to make art "about nothing." Despite her own arguments to the contrary, UNRELIABLE NARRATOR is undeniable proof that Aparna is a force -- as a comedian and author alike -- to be reckoned with.

• We started tracking this book on March 31, 2023.
• This book was $14.99 when we started tracking it.
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• The current price of this book is $5.99 last checked one day ago.
• The lowest price to date was $5.99 last reached on February 17, 2025.
• This book has been $5.99 one time since we started tracking it.
• The highest price to date was $14.99 last reached on March 31, 2023.
• This book has been $14.99 one time since we started tracking it.
• This book is currently at its lowest price since we started tracking it.

• Humor & Entertainment

• Text-to-Speech: Disabled
• Lending: Disabled
• Print Length: 301 Pages
• File Size: 5,519 KB