The Bedwetter

Starred review from March 29, 2010
Demonstrating that her penchant for swearing began at an early age, comedian Silverman begins her hilarious memoir by describing how, at age three, she gleefully responded to her grandmother's offer of brownies with “shove 'em up your ass.” Growing up in New Hampshire (“where cows are well done and Jews are rare”), Silverman naturally gravitated toward performing and moved to New York, where she attended and eventually dropped out of New York University to pursue a standup comedy career. Mixing show business moments (she wrote for Saturday Night Live
for one season, but none of her sketches made it past dress rehearsal) with stories of her childhood and adolescence (punctuated by a persistent bedwetting problem), Silverman never shies away from poking fun at her own expense. Though she's best known for sexually explicit jokes, Silverman is able to address more serious subjects in the book without losing her edge, particularly her teenage struggle with depression and that her often abrasive public persona allowed her to “say what I didn't mean, even preach the opposite of what I believed.... It was a funny way of being sincere.” 8-page color insert.

June 28, 2010
In this somewhat disjointed but appealing memoir, comedian Silverman chirpily narrates anecdotes about growing up Jewish in New Hampshire, her struggles with depression and bedwetting, her efforts to make it in comedy, the fun she's had working on her (now canceled) Comedy Central show, and coping with the controversy her jokes generate. Silverman's comic timing enhances the text; her little-girl voice clashes well with her exuberant love for crudity and fart jokes, and lends the more serious sections an unexpected poignancy. A Harper hardcover (Reviews, Mar. 29).