Adult Drama - by Natalie Beach (Hardcover)

About the Book

"Natalie Beach became an Internet sensation when her essay on her toxic friendship with Instagram influencer Caroline Calloway went viral. Now, for the first time, and in her own indelible voice, Beach offers a glimpse into her own life alongside a broader cultural criticism of the world we live in today. Through stories of heartbreak, odd jobs, political activism, existential crises, and low-rise jeans, [she] explores the high stakes and absurdist comedy of coming of age in a world gone mad"--Dust jacket flap.

Book Synopsis

Named a Most Anticipated Book in...
Harper's Bazaar
Elle
Bookpage
Vulture's "Into It"

From the writer whose New York Magazine piece "I Was Caroline Calloway" broke the internet comes a fresh, incisive, laugh-out-loud funny memoir-in-essays about the frenzied journey to adulthood.

Natalie Beach became an internet sensation when her essay on her toxic friendship with Instagram influencer Caroline Calloway went viral. Now, for the first time, and in her own indelible voice, Beach offers a revelatory glimpse into her own life alongside a broader cultural criticism of the world today. Through stories of heartbreak, odd jobs, political activism, existential crises and low-rise jeans, Natalie Beach explores the high stakes and absurdist comedy of coming of age in a world gone mad.

Effervescent, hilarious and unflinchingly self-aware, Adult Drama marks the arrival of an electrifying new literary voice.

Review Quotes

"[A]n elegant memoir-in-essays... Incisive and candid, this is a must-read."--Publishers Weekly STARRED review

"Beach's voice is a synthesis of whip-smart cultural commentary and vulnerable self-reflection as she searches for an identity she can call hers -- contractor, shopgirl, estate-sale junkie, memoirist. Adult Drama is an unflinching self portrait by an artist who's done with telling any story that isn't hers."--Booklist

"From existential crises to breakups to her time as an activist and in the workplace, Beach will captivate readers from beginning to end in this highly-anticipated debut."--The Messenger

"Natalie Beach is the main character now... [Adult Drama is] about the rest of her life: the many jobs she's had, working as an abortion clinic escort, her New York roommates, estate sales, and marrying her husband as he was losing his mother, with, yes, a bit of Calloway thrown in for good measure."--Elle

"Eclectic essays about estate sales, abortion clinics and Abercrombie & Fitch are as trenchant as they are tender...Beach is sublime...a talented essayist with a promising career ahead of her."--Washington Post

"Beach's reflective tone belies the explosive topics in these essays."--New York Times Book Review

"Adult Drama is an auspicious debut, a captivating book about identity and coming-of-age."--Largehearted Boy

"Beach has a profile writer's eye for comic specificity."--The New Yorker

"Natalie Beach is a writer whose work feels like it contains the force of a revelation. These essays both delighted and astonished me, often within the same sentence, for their ribald and vulnerable intimacy, the canny insight with which she examines how we shape ourselves within friendships, within clothes--from low-rise jeans to soccer shorts--within the various pressures and structures of modern life. This debut marks the arrival of a major new talent, a voice readers are going to deeply identify with and love, to read and re-read again and again."--Mary South, author of You Will Never Be Forgotten

"From her intensely intelligent essays to her downright poetic text messages, Natalie Beach's distinctive voice combines erudition, humor, and incisiveness in a way that I've admired for many years. There's truly no one I'd rather read on the subject of existential dread and growing up. I'd devour Natalie's grocery lists if she let me!"--Amanda Montell, author of Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism