Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed - Edited by Meghan Daum

⭐ 7.0/10

(Originally written by Magdalene)

Another collection, this time of essays written by authors (mostly female, but some male) who have decided not to have kids, and explain their reasons for their decisions.

I really like the idea behind this collection, but after a while, all of the essays started blending together. Most of their reasoning was similar - felt no desire to ever have kids, were too devoted to their careers, and maybe struggled with bad mental health.

As someone who is so far ambivalent about ever having kids, it was an interesting read, and most of the authors definitely weren't trying to convince readers that having kids was a bad idea. But I can't imagine people who have or want kids really enjoying this, unless they really wanted to try to understand why someone would decided not to.

Another thing that bummed me out is that I'm pretty sure all of them mentioned that by not having kids, they were able to devote more of their attention to their writing careers, which was really fulfilling for them. And it makes sense, because all of the people writing these essays are obviously authors. But I don't have a career that I care about! What about people without kids or a vocation??

Anyway, I listened to this on audio, and it was a pretty quick listen, so I don't regret it. And I did learn tons. It just didn't really do what I hoped it would.