i love great memoirs and this one was most definitely a great memoir. tysm for the arc, would recommend it quite a bit. 5 stars.

The author was born with a rare disorder that, among other things, causes her legs to be different sizes and a large mass on her back. This memoir discusses her struggles with dating, her weight, and her need to belong. Candid and funny.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for the ARC!

In this memoir, Sosenko discusses the impact of her disability on friendships, family, her body image, and relationships.
The relationship with food/diet is very familiar, including the dieting and WW. The story of her relationship and hoping that she found love were heartbreaking.
A good insight on the different ways living with a disability impacts a person.

I have to admit that once I saw the title "I'll Look So Hot in a Coffin," I was immediately drawn to this memoirish book of essays by writer/author/editor Carla Sosenko.

As a lifelong paraplegic born with spina bifida (think open spine, scoliosis, urostomy and other oddities) who is now also a double amputee wheelchair user who survived two types of cancer in the past year, I'm likely to be a fan of anyone who approaches the human body with a certain degree of humor, vulnerability, and irreverence.

That's Carla Sosenko.

Sosenko was born with Klippel-Trenaunay Syndrome, a rare vascular disorder resulting in legs of different sizes, a mass of flesh on her back, a hunched posture, and other physical peculiarities. Over the years, Sosenko seemed to vacillate between hiding her body and flaunting it. I can identify with this having bounced between hypersexuality and practical priesthood until I discovered, well, me.

"I'll Look So Hot in a Coffin" is candid and funny with occasional fits of melancholy and insight tossed in for good measure. Sosenko shares with remarkable candor what it was like growing up in an "unconventional" body and how it impacted her self-image, relationships, opportunities, mental health, and pretty much everything else.

She writes about having what amounted to forced liposuction at age eight (which for the record really ticks me off), her adventures with Weight Watchers, her views toward diet culture, her relationships (including a particularly unhealthy one that undoubtedly crossed the line into domestic violence), her transition into adulthood, and the somewhat miracle yet gift that resulted in her moving into a high-profile and very successful career in media.

Sosenko shares, at times uncomfortably so, her sense of isolation and her experiences with anxiety. She shares an awareness of being different, however, also not necessarily through the lens of disability. She learns, and at times it feels like she's learning it even as she writes, how to claim her body and to stop allowing others to define her life experience for her.

At times, I longed for that transition to be more obvious in "I'll Look So Hot in a Coffin." The last chapter, easily my favorite, feels like the lens I really longed for knowing where she's ended up. This sounds weird, at least for me, as I certainly valued Sosenko's meaningful and remarkably honest and open journey, however, I will admit I needed to experience the Sosenko who really claimed her life and her success and her, well, beauty (and if you've seen photos of her she is both physically unique and quite beautiful). I wanted to see the link between her journey between those "thoughts I used to have about my body" and how she learned to live her good life. In the final chapter, which both made me smile and somewhat brought me to tears (Yes, it's possible to be somewhat brought to tears), we begin to see how Sosenko took everything she experienced and became f***ing amazing.

"I'll Look So Hot in a Coffin," for us religious folks, feels like a cousin to "In heaven, you'll be "normal." F*** that. I love who I am now. If I have to change in heaven, I'm not interested.

"I'll Look So Hot in a Coffin" is an ideal memoir for anyone who's ever felt different, like an outsider, or like they don't have a place in the world. Taking a journey from feeling like she's taking up space to celebrating what sets her apart, Sosenko provides hope and celebration for all of us, myself included, who are square pegs in a round world.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this book in exchange for an honest review.
I was most interested in this book because of the syndrome she has. My husband has this and I have a disability that I try to hide. So some of this book was relatable.
She writes with honesty and humor as she navigates her childhood then onto adult relationships.

I'm a sucker for a good memoir, and this is for sure one of my favorites of the year. Simultaneously hilarious, deeply honest, life-affirming, and wonderfully irreverent, Sosenko's writing made me feel like I was sitting at the bar with someone much more interesting than me listening to them chat about both their greatest success and greatest failures with untold joy and a dash of cynicism. I adored the creative liberties taken here, the topical layout, and the truths about the irrelevance of how any of our bodies look on any given day that I needed to hear again. Let's be honest, I need to hear them most days. I laughed actually out loud, immediately shared excerpts with my friends, and am already itching to start a reread.

12/10 would recommend for any woman in America (period), especially those who don't fit into today's "ideal body type" box.

Thank you #Netgalley for the advanced copy.

This read follows Carla in a series of essays documenting experiences throughout her life, both good and bad. Carla addresses her physical assets and how her health conditions have influenced her life to eventually not letting control her. This book really shows how Carla has evolved all tied with real life experiences, recommendations, funny lists and so much more.