Book number 34 for this year – “Am I There Yet?” by Mari Andrew. This book was somewhere between “self-help” and “personal diary”. It took me three days to finish, because it was challenging to keep my interest alive over its content.

Most of the book is like a guide about how to survive your twenties. The author talks about her personal trials and thoughts on dating, travelling, doodling and how she found her calling. So there are a lot of anecdotes, sprinkled with doodles and charts in between. For me, the pages were neither relatable nor interesting. There were a few times that I just wanted to stop reading, but soldiered on. Although skipping some boring paragraphs was inevitable.

All that said, one can understand why this book is a ‘New York Tines bestseller’, because it’s perhaps very “American”. A lot of young U.S women/men might find it funny, relatable or even comforting. However, for a lot of other readers, the content could come across as generic self-help stuff that they’ve already heard too often. Too tedious.

Another problem with the book was the fact that I had expected more doodles and was disappointed with how text heavy it was, considering it is categorized under “comics & graphic novels”. It’s a little misleading for readers. Not just that, the doodles were too plain, repetitive and not fun to look at.

Well, “Am I There Yet” is just not for my shelf (the paperback I read was borrowed) and wouldn’t recommend it. But if it sounds like something you would be interested in, go ahead, order a copy.

Please check our podcast by the same name on YouTube out – AbstractAF.

If you want some good graphic novel recommendations, listen to episode 15. And do subscribe!