Nothing is more embarrassing than reading this book while on a bus with 33 of your coworkers and laughing so hard you snort, only to be asked what you were laughing so hard about and explaining as quietly as possible that you were laughing at a description of the author performing fellatio on an older Austrian gentleman when, to her surprise, she is face to face with an uncircumcised penis.

Actually, come to think of it, even more embarrassing is explaining all of this to your mother — I had the pleasure of doing this as I sat on my parent’s couch reading and feeding my niece. Thankfully my niece is only three months old and cannot read because she is not old enough to know about these things. Neither are my sisters — I would like to inquire about chastity belts forged with the strongest irons in the world so if anyone has information about this, please put me in touch with the right people.

Rachel Shukert’s memoir, Everything Is Going To Be Great: An Underfunded & Overexposed European Grand Tour is one of the most hilarious memoirs, actually books, I have ever read. I can’t say that my European escapades were ever worthy of writing a book about them, but I can relate to ending up in the hospital in a foreign country because one has consumed too much alcohol. I still haven’t figured out if I was in a hospital or if I made that whole thing up and actually spent the night in an alley. Regardless of my hazy memory, Rachel recreates her adventures with witty, self-deprecating humor — my favorite kind.

Graduating college and moving on to the “next big thing” in your life is a scary process. Finding a job, becoming an adult; these are things we think about but once we are forced into these situations — we try to delay this as long as possible — we often make some bad decisions. Rachel takes us on her journey post-college as she finds a non-paying acting gig and touring Europe with the play in a non-speaking role. She offers up anecdotes from her college years, pre-college years, all the while her mother calls and writes to kvetch — if there was a kvetching award, her mother would probably win.

The stories in Everything Is Going To Be Great are hilarious and memorable. Beyond this, Shukert lets us know that making mistakes is okay and that we can still survive if we make them — our lives don’t have to be perfect in order to work out.

This is Shukert’s second memoir — she isn’t even 30 (get on it slackers) — and is quickly becoming one of my favorite memoirists. She has written pieces for McSweeney’s and The Daily Beast and I caught her contribution to the WSJ site about [b:Eat, Pray, Love|19501|Eat, Pray, Love|Elizabeth Gilbert|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1269870432s/19501.jpg|3352398].

Have any of you read this? If not, I highly suggest you do. She’s like the female version of David Sedaris if you added in Judaism and more sex. ( )

An autobiographical account of the author's time traveling Europe, mostly as an extra with a traveling theater company.
I read up to page 170, out of 309, then decided I'd had enough. I don't know how much of this book is actually true, as there are several conversations that sound contrived, and it's hard to believe that someone makes so many horrible decisions, yet is still alive. Shukert seems to think that being stupid and gross is the same as having a personality. She can write, and some of the stuff is amusing, but I couldn't go on after she writes about being sexually assaulted by two acquaintances, whom she gets away from, and not only doesn't call the police, but simply tells her roommate that she's had a rough night. I just can't relate to the way her brain works. ( )

This is not a travel guide and it is barely a travelogue. Why do people think it is? Shukert mentions her travels a little bit, but this book is mostly a self-involved memoir about Shukert's messy early 20s traveling around Europe broke, drunk, and with terrible taste in men. Being a big fan of the self-involved memoir, especially ones that center around being broke, drunk, and dating bad men, I gotta say I really liked this book. ( )

bleck. this books sounds a lot more interesting than it trying is.... also the writing style the author chose to use is not the best for the type of story she is telling

After college, Rachel Shukert ended up working for free for a well-known experimental theater director. The play took a brief tour of Europe, and Rachel was thrilled when she found out that her passport had not been stamped. That meant she could stay in Europe as long as she wanted without a visa, since no one officially knew she was there. Setting out to "find herself," she ends up living with two of her gay best friends in Amsterdam, jobless, but more than willing to try out the local booze and dating scene.

I'm not the right reader for this book. Call me a prude if you want, but I somehow (thankfully) avoided the stage of life that Rachel Shukert describes in her memoir. I don't understand the appeal of drinking until you end up in the hospital, or waking up with a man you met for the first time the night before. So when I ran into both things within the first few pages of this memoir, I knew this wasn't going to be a book that I connected with.

If you did go through this stage, perhaps you'll enjoy this memoir more than I did. It is funny, but, like I said, I just didn't really connect with what Rachel was going through inflicting on herself.

The book is well-written, and I did end up cheering for Rachel in the end, but the lifestyle described in the pages is a turn-off for me.

Thanks to the publisher for sending me a copy for review. ( )