It’s a funny book. But at three-quarters of the way through, the humor started to wear thin. I recommend you don’t read it all at once. You don’t have to read it in sequence. Take breaks, read something else in-between. The jokes are intense and fast, but it’s overwhelming. As in, it’s not relaxing to read. Maybe it has a Police Squad effect.

Police Squad is a television show from 1982. I learned about it in high school in a unit in English about films. Everyone who sees it thinks it’s hilarious–and why shouldn’t it be? It’s from the Zucker-Abraham-Zucker trifecta. The same people who did The Naked Gun, Airplane!, Hot Shots, and other fantastic comedies. But Police Squad only lasted six episodes. Why?

Because it was too much for viewing audiences who wanted to relax and watch TV. If you watch The Naked Gun and Airplane!, you see there are a TON of jokes. Visual gags and puns and subtle humor and slapstick and parody and fourth-wall breaks. There’re even jokes embedded in the credits (if you have the patience). But it works because, in a movie, all your focus is on the movie. But with TV, you’re talking to people, you’re relaxing with a glass of wine, you’re going to the bathroom, you’re talking with your wife. Police Squad forces you to pay attention to get all the jokes, because there are so many.

In Furiously Happy, the biggest flaw is that the same joke gets told over and over. I get it — you’re a wacky mentally ill woman trying to have it all and still survive and you’re into weird stuff like raccoon taxidermy. Basically a Manic Pixie Dream Girl. But real because she has rheumatoid arthritis, bouts of depression, and personality disorders.

I’m thinking maybe I’m not cut out for non-fiction memoirs by underprivileged women. It started off so strongly, but at a certain point, I just got overwhelmed by her.