A review by doritobabe
Memoirs and Misinformation by Dana Vachon, Jim Carrey

4.0

4/5

My first review upon completion: "Super weird. Loved it."

My second review after a month:

I still love this book. I love thinking about reading this book. What a dazzling fever dream that kept me pondering but also completely engaged as the "story" unfurled.

Whatever Carrey and Vachon wanted this book to be, I am not sure. Everyone who reads it will have a differing opinion and likely tout it for being a "literary achievement", or perhaps accolades will pour in about the dark humor; the social commentary, etc. etc. For fear of being one of those folks - who are not wrong, mind you - I want to the err on the side of: "I have no idea what his point was, but I loved every page that I turned."

Why am I not rating this 5 stars then, you ask? It is because the book itself "devolved" into a "story" that, to me, was not as captivating as the caricatures developed and the somewhat-incoherent and uncomfortable ramblings that were so excellently developed in the first 2/3rds of the text. I could care less about
Spoiler the alien invasion and the kidnapping.
Though these were elements I adored, I cared more about who the characters were and their stories and how they "got" to the point that they were in the story. For example, Carrey and Vachon basically gave every newly introduced person a little write up as to what happened to make them be the way they are/were in the text. These were the best fictional anecdotes; they were fun and adventurous.

I have definitely recommended this to a few people and thing it is a fun Covid read. Get your mind off things and explore a reality-fantasy.