I appreciate how honest Chelsea Devantez is, even through the redacted sentences. It's clear, it's jumping off the page, the pain she endures, the terror she feels under the throttle of the perpetrator(s) in her life. I'd highly recommend this memoir for any person who has felt trapped, thinking they have no way out. The highlights are some of her healthy relationships with women. Women who come through, women who listen, women who pay attention. It's a village we form throughout our short lives.

What a fantastic read!! I have to admit, I was a little annoyed when I started reading the first chapter and got to the blacked-out portions. If I'm being honest, I wish there was more of an explanation as to why in the beginning. I only really understood the why after listening to Chelsea talk about it on her podcast. In the moment, it definitely left me confused as a reader. That is truly my only critique of the book. The writing was fantastic, the stories were punchy and laugh-out-loud funny, and the ending left me in a puddle of tears. Chelsea is an incredible writer and I hope she gets many more chances to write and publish because she deserves it. As a fan of memoirs, this is up there as one of my favorites. It was an incredibly satisfying read because it left me feeling like the author truly knows herself, and man, what a gift for both her and her readers. A lot of memoirs are written too soon, before the author has fully had a moment to reflect. This memoir is "fully baked," and while I wouldn't say there's a happy ending, the wisdom she shares is something everyone can learn from. I already know I will read this memoir again and take new lessons from it. Thank you, Chelsea, for being so vulnerable and honest in the sharing of your truth!

This is one of the most powerful memoirs I’ve read. Chelsea Devantez is a force, and her extreme vulnerability and courage is something that will stick with me forever. I loved the structure of this memoir, not told exactly chromatically but structured around the important women in various points in her life. I so appreciated her self awareness looking back on old unhealthy friendships, her insight into why female celebrity memoirs meant so much to her growing up (and still to this day!), and of course her power in telling [what she could] of her experiences with domestic violence. I’ll never forget her points about how the systems put in place to help victims actually end up silencing them. The content of this memoir is so heavy at times, but Chelsea is so funny that she had me laughing out loud in between moments of tears. Cannot recommend enough!!

Wow! While this type of writing (confessional essays written by your future bestie vibe) is my least favorite, I still enjoyed the author’s funny, but sometimes tragic stories. From her exploration of religion to sex, there are definitely many overshares which happen to be really exciting!

I tried to read this as well as listen to the audio from another platform and it seemed very off putting to me. Unfortunately, i chose to DNF this and I won't be trying to pick it back up. I'm sorry!

I really enjoyed this one! I did not know who she was prior to reading this, but she is behind some of the best TV in recent memory. Some parts of this book were genuinely, laugh-out-loud funny. However, it is also meaningful - she, of course, details her own life experiences, including abuse, but in a way that doesn't expose you to the nitty gritty of it while still understanding how weighty it was and how she has worked to overcome it. Really enjoyed!

This focuses mainly on the quest to become a comedienne and writer. With a rough childhood, Devantez pours her all into friendships and showcasing her talent. I liked the part about her mother towards the end which is a loving tribute and when she writes about forgiveness. Some pars weren't as good as others and while there are some amusing bits, her history is not. A writer for Jon Stewart and a celebrity memoir enthusiast, this is Devantez's first book.

Copy provided by the publisher and Netgalley

I Shouldn’t Be Telling You This was a super enjoyable read. Chelsea is hilarious and managed to write a book that reads like talking with your funny best friend even when the topics are super heavy. She seems like the kind of woman we need more of across all industries, looking for ways to collaborate with and elevate other women while removing barriers for those coming behind her as she cuts her path. She handled the redactions elegantly and still made her point via what was unsaid rather than said, which was perhaps even more powerful in the end. 4 stars instead of 5 because the industry stories got to be a bit boring toward the back 25% of the book but overall a solid read.

This book was so good! So layered, funny, heartful, etc. I felt every emotion, I felt for Chelsea, and I learned a lot.

Would definitely recommend this book to everyone!

Thank you NetGalley for a copy of this book!

I have to be honest, I judge books by their covers. And I 100% picked up this book because I saw the cover and thought "WOW, that looks like an interesting thriller!" Spoiler alert: it is not a thriller. To my surprise it is a memoir. But tell me that title, on what looks like a bathroom tile, doesn't give thriller. That aside, this well-written book is the memoir of the comedian (and writer, and actress, and many other things), Chelsea Devantez.

I have to say for being the memoir of a celebrity I've never heard of, I was really invested in this book, especially in the beginning. It had the ominous feel like something really bad was about to happen... and we were all going to be able to laugh about it. And we did! Yes, there are some traumatic experiences that she discusses in very light hearted ways, that don't diminish the experiences, but also find the humor in them.

I would say that this book was laughing in my head funny (as opposed to laugh out loud funny). I enjoyed the way she throws in punchy lines. However, as the book progressed I started to lose the sense of purpose in some of the chapters. I didn't really understand what we were supposed to take away or why some of the later chapters were included. Primarily the one about her wedding. I'm sure it was a very important event in her life, but felt like filler in the book. I would have LOVED to hear endless stories about her mother and godmother.

Overall, I'm really glad I surprised myself with reading this book and stepping into a genre I don't usually enjoy, but did in this case!

I received a complimentary copy of this book via Netgalley. Opinions expressed in this review are my own.

I'll be honest, I chose to read this book because I saw Jon Stewart's name. I'm glad I did because this book was fantastic.

I'm a huge fan of comedy and autobiographies so this was right up my alley. It's such a fascinating community that work their butts off to fill so little spaces to make people laugh. It's intriguing to me.

I wasn't a big fan of the beginning of the book. I considered putting it down and not finishing it several times. I really hate not finishing books so I kept picking it back up. At 50% I really loved the stories and enjoyed the second half of the book tremendously. It was hard to stick with that first half though.

I loved this book SO much!! I don’t rate memoirs or anything of the type (feels wrong to rate someone’s life), but I will say that this is a must-read! (Or a must listen!) I tried to read this slowly at first, to savor it if you will, but @htp_hive said it’s best to consume all at once. I was able to get an audio copy come through from Libby while I was a third of the way in, and the author narrates it herself, so of course it was 🔥.

I knew a little bit about Chelsea Devantez going in to this, but didn’t actually realize it. I had watched Jon Stewart’s show “The Problem” before, Girls5eva (I loved that show!), and Not Dead Yet - all of which she was a writer/head writer, and all of which I find hilarious, so that makes sense I’d find her book hilarious, as well.

Her memoir-in-essays is so much more than funny stories, though. This girl has been through some stuff. And unfortunately, some of said stuff was not able to be printed because of how messed up our justice system is at “protecting” survivors of domestic abuse. But Chelsea rallies and decides to tell her story with almost everything redacted, so it instead becomes a story of how our systems silence women and victims. (Talk about life-lemons-lemonade and all that crap.)

Devantez has so many good essays in this book; I’m not sure I’m even able to pick a favorite. I loved learning about her Godmother in the beginning, the true friends she makes along the way, growing up in the 90s/ early 2000s and the body shaming culture then (don’t I know it), and her notes to her mother, and then herself. (And yes I did cry because 🥺😢). How she makes you laugh while being outraged or tearful is a true feat, and one of the reasons you should read this book. Go on, go get it!

This memoir had humor, wisdom, sweetness (especially about the women in her life), difficult areas (trigger warning: mostly vaguely, but contains references to domestic violence), and some really interesting stuff just about the author herself; a somewhat-celebrity about whose accomplishments I knew nothing.

However, I didn’t really enjoy the book. I found her style of writing kind of disconnected; things happened then she moved on to something else and maybe later referenced the former thing; a bit scattered for my enjoyability. On top of this a good percentage of her verbiage (especially when trying to be funny) seemed very much her own “in” way of speaking and I often didn’t get it. (And I don’t consider myself clueless nor stupid). I’m having a hard time thinking of how to explain it. Like… she very often used metaphors or thoughts that are reliant on her own way of communicating (almost as if you would need to know her personally to get it; maybe that’s an apt explanation). Additionally, the whole beginning was, for me, a turn-off: where she redacts most of the text. This occurs again later toward the end. Although we could make out basically what happened, this device of trying to make it interesting or coy or I don’t know what, didn’t work for me. It was too much and too obscure.

The plot was…well, it’s a memoir! A comedy performer and mostly comedy writer, working her way up from poverty, and her upbringing, those who helped her, those she loved (mostly gal pals, featured wonderfully, & a lovely tribute to her mom), those who crossed her (well, a few; one gets the feeling there are far too many to mention in show biz). And her neurosis, fears, & traumas, and how she works through them to find her strength as well as useful aspects of vulnerability.

Here are a few excerpts I liked, simply in order of the where they came in the book, for you to consider if you might find the book more to your liking.


About domestic valence survivors:
"We are all taught to be sweet be polite, be normal, don’t rock the boat, so that those at the top can hold onto the power that doesn’t belong to them in the first place. We grow up siloed in our fucked-up memories, and we walk around feeling helpless and alone in our pain. And as long as we feel alone, then we’ll never realize how many of us there are."

She found memoirs of female comedians and celebrities, and these helped her so much that she began to podcast about them:
"Every time someone shares their story, the lie that we are alone in our pain is shattered, and the more I read these women’s stories, the more I can reach the surface myself."

"I can tell you with much wisdom that the biggest problem with cults is that they are fucking awesome. It’s an instant community, the rules are clear, rewards are always promised, and there are usually drugs. At any second I could fall into a cult because I love self-help. I’m always eager to find all the ways I’m terrible and try to improve them."

<i> My whole adult life, I thought I was suffering at the hands of my own shitty personality, but it turns out those flaws weren’t personality traits at all, they were symptoms. Workaholism. Hating new situations. No curiosity to travel. Hyper vigilance for safety. Even some of the good parts of who I am—my go-getter energy, my overfriendliness, my sixth sense about which asshole was going to approach us in a bar—were fueled or even created by this disorder. [complex PTSD].</i>

"My current life had become so wonderful and filled with love and stability, but my body couldn’t seem to accept that I was no longer under attack…I was stuck inside my own mind with my memories , boxing a ghost."

"I have two modes: pajamas and Met Gala, and I never pass up an opportunity to turn up the volume on either."

"Every time I’m at work in fancy Hollywood writers’ rooms and I hear a coworker say something like, “My old private school helped fund that pervert fascist’s political campaign, but I’m still giving them money so my daughter can get in there one day!’ or “Our new house is under construction, and I’m so jealous of the roofers. Imagine how simple of a job that is, no stress at all..." or "My toddler’s favorite food is sashimi,” I think to myself, Thank fucking God I grew up on mac and cheese and libraries."

" My mom taught me resilience and how to fight back and showed me how, through it all, to protect your gentleness. I refused this for so long, relying on anger and pain to push me forward when I felt weak, but one day I woke up and there it was, a small kernel of tenderness had remained. My mom had planted it there long ago and nurtured it through each phone call and text and trip to see me, urging me not to wall off my heart."

" If there is another Young Me reading this, I hope...it was clear that it’s the community she builds around herself that matters more than anything she’ll ever do.
If nothing else, I hope she knows that normal is a vicious prank, and likability is a slow poison, and that she should forever be too much and never make herself less.
I hope she continues to live for Young Me and shouts her own story wherever she goes, since in the end, I could not."

I wish to very much thank NetGalley, Hanover Press and Harper Collins for an e-copy of this book in exchange for my unbiased review.

Chelsea Devantez tells the story of her life. A memoir that disturbing and equally hilarious. She shares intimate details of her life that included domestic abuse for her mother that eventually led to repeating in her own life. She also encountered neglect as a teenager and other disturbing details. She definitely had a rough childhood.

This was also heartwarming in parts where Chelsea shares details of her relationships with family and friends. I literally cracked up laughing at many parts. I admire her vulnerability to share every aspect of her life with us. I will say there are many trigger warnings throughout the book so please check those before reading.

Bravo, Chelsea Devantez! I highly enjoyed this memoir and thank you for sharing your most intimate moments in life.

TW- domestic violence, weight issues, suicide, neglect, infertility, drug use and I’m probably missing some.

Thank you so much HTP, Chelsea Devantez and NetGalley for the opportunity. All opinions are my own.

I love Chelsea's podcast, Glamorous Trash, and I've been listening almost since the beginning, so I knew I would read her memoir as soon as it came out. I'm so glad because I loved it. Her writing is an equal mix of hilarious and dead serious trauma, that is honestly the perfect balance to strike in a memoir. If you can't find the funny moments sprinkled throughout the difficult ones, what is even the point? I loved her approach to writing her memoir and giving the reader really intimate details about her childhood, while showing how all of these things that happened to her make her who she is today as an adult. There is a not insignificant part of the book that is blacked out due to legal issues surrounding the domestic violence she endured as a young person, and the choice to black out huge chunks of this one chapter (rather than leave this section out entirely) tells a different story than I think she was originally intending to tell. The story she ends up telling in this section of the book is one about being silenced as women and being told that our stories are not as important as the stories of those who have inflicted pain upon us (usually men). It's a story about having money and being famous and still not being allowed to be honest about something traumatic that happened in her life. It's really affecting and I admire Chelsea for choosing to put this story in the book in this way. Overall, this is such a strong memoir.

This was so good, but so infuriatingly heartbreaking. I love that she conquered her trauma, but I’m mad that she had to in the first place. The system needs to do better for victims, ten fold.

Thanks to the Hanover Square and Netgalley for this eARC.

In the realm of memoirs, Chelsea Devantez’s “I Shouldn’t Be Telling You This” emerges as a raw, unfiltered journey through the trenches of life’s absurdities and the comedy industry’s labyrinth.

Told with a razor sharp wit, this book is (obviously) not for the faint of heart or the easily shocked.

Devantez, an Emmy-nominated writer, stitches together a patchwork of essays that are as much a mosaic of her life as they are a tribute to the women who’ve shaped it.

From the outset, Devantez sets the tone with a candid recounting of her upbringing, marked by poverty and the colorful parade of her mother’s partners. Her narrative is a rollercoaster that zips through her formative years in New York and Chicago’s cutthroat comedy scenes, culminating in a wedding that’s as unconventional as her path to the altar.

The book’s structure, eschewing chronological order for thematic resonance, mirrors the unpredictability of Devantez’s experiences. While this choice may sacrifice a linear sense of momentum, it lends authenticity to the storytelling, allowing each essay to stand as a poignant vignette of life’s chaotic tapestry.

Devantez’s humor is her shield and sword, wielded with precision to dissect her trials and triumphs. Her reflections on navigating a career in comedy — rife with gatekeeping and paradoxical expectations—are particularly incisive, offering a window into the industry’s often opaque machinations.

Yet, it’s the women in Devantez’s life who steal the show. From her heartbreakingly supportive mother to the enigmatic Shitbitch, each character is rendered with depth and complexity, highlighting the multifaceted nature of female relationships.

While parts of her story remain shrouded due to legal constraints, the redacted sections add to the book’s mystique, inviting readers to read between the lines, and I found the redactions clever and humorous.

Devantez’s voice is a clarion call for authenticity in a world that often demands conformity, making “I Shouldn’t Be Telling You This” a testament to the power of owning one’s narrative.

Chelsea Devantez’s memoir is a compelling collage of humor, heartache, and the hard-won wisdom of a woman who’s carved her niche in the world with irreverent grace. It’s a story that’s enlightening and entertaining, one that resonates with the tenacity of the human spirit.

My favorite Chelsea Devantez quote is "I guess that's what happens when you nearest bookstore growing up is a Walmart." It's the same truth for me, and the same for a lot of us who have grown up in the rural parts of this country. So much better than a Joseph Campbell quote or the story of two wolves.

Do I have to disclose that I am a 'Cookie'? I am, I was going to give this 5 stars if it was GAR-BAGE, because I love Glamours Trash (Formerly Celebrity Book Club) so much. Note I took during my read: I'm so indoctrinated into the cult of cookie, and Chelsea is my mother god. Please don't tell me to drink colloidal silver! Here I go with my thoughts and a bold lip.

PLEASE MORE BOOKS ABOUT FEMALE RELATIONSHIPS! Where would I be without the women in my life? Each chapter of Chelsea's story, had me thinking about who that person was for me in my life, and the versions of myself that I have walked in. It also made me come to terms in my role in my big best friend breakup, and gave me the term for Shitbitches for some others.

This book inspired me to reach back out to my middle school best friend, who is also named Britney spelled Britnie. She saved me from loneliness back when we were kids, though ironically hers was the stepdad energy, one girl three brothers, overworked mom household. Also the first place I ever heard Jeff Foxworthy and Larry the Cable Guy, so it all comes together. She also had a situation in high school involving domestic violence with a boyfriend that is similar to the story I know is blacked out in here. Chelsea recounting this part of her life, really put me back into that time in our lives when our friendship and need to be top grade students kept us together. We got together for lunch last week, and those old bonds still hold.

Let me also just throw in that I've grown up in an LDS community, but wasn't ever able to conform to that mold and mentality. I once had a child I was caring for tell me she was going to pray for my soul not to go to hell since I was wearing a crucifix. There's a lot to say there. I have been to many a party of "Baby, If you love me smile". Her respect for the people and not ridiculing their beliefs was also a comfort to me. It's not something I believe in, and there are many things I have a problem with, but I've had some incredible LDS friends that I would never poke fun at.

Thank you so much Chelsea Devantez for creating a community I love being apart of, and for writing this book. Please continue to create, and if you do see me in your nightmares, I hope that I can help you fight your way out of them! Also thank you for introducing me to Prados lipsticks and eyeshadows! From one southwest girl to another, bless you!

This memoir was absolutely incredible Chelsea's ability to speak her truth with such a raw and real emotion is incredible. Memoirs are one of those things where you can't really judge it because it's someones life experiences, but on the other hand you can find yourself thinking that maybe they should have just kept it to themselves. In this particular case, I am so glad she didn't. This is going to be one of those things that stick with me for a long time.