Congratulations, The Best Is Over!: Essays

It's very difficult to find a book that can make you burst out laughing and then start crying at various points, but this one is gorgeous and does an amazing job at it. I hadn't read the author's first book of essays, but I definitely need to if it's as good as this one. His love/hate relationship with Baltimore alone is worth the price of admission, but he really does word things beautifully and takes the reader on a fun yet poignant journey with him. Listening to him read his book in audio was wonderful too.

A hilarious, heartfelt and engaging collection of essays on grief, expectations, and both found and biological families. Set against the backdrop of the pandemic, cross city and interstate moves, and evolving relationships, Thomas keeps his prose fast paced and jovial even dealing with heavy topics. The result feels like catching up with an old friend over beer.

An absolute delight. I loved his first book and couldn’t wait to get my hands on the audio of this one. He is so funny, he reminds me a bit of Sedaris. This collection of essays includes thoughts on the pandemic and marriage. He blends humor with serious moments of grief. I loved it.

“All of which was to say, the world is so strange and so wild and sometimes so beautiful and I am so many different versions of myself away from you, but I’m trying to share as much of it as I can.”

R. Eric Thomas is a gem! I thoroughly enjoyed his first memoir "Here for It, or How to Save Your Soul in America". This is even better. Walking through a couple of years pre-pandemic and through Covid, Thomas ruminates on the state of the world, the state of his life and who he is. It sounds very serious but he does it such a down to earth and HILARIOUS way that I laughed out loud multiple times while reading. This book is filled with humor and hope, two of my favorite storytelling themes.

9 April 2025

On my GoodReads page for this book, the space beneath where my review would go is Jenny Lawson. Y'all, I know my limitations: I cannot top Jenny Lawson.

However, I am here, and I have a few thoughts. Thomas came to my attention when his advice column began in the Washington Post, which I was mostly reading for the advice columns. Carolyn Hax is very good at what she does. Miss Manners' column has been impressing me for probably more years than either of us would like to acknowledge. Thomas was a charming addition to this lauded team: he is funny and just so kind. So yes, when I knew there were books, I added my name to the library(s) queues. To my delight, my turn came up pretty quick. But...

...I wasn't feeling it. My reading show more has gone way the hell down, and honestly, if I am not going to finish a book anyway, I would rather that failure not be something I have high hopes for. So the next person in line got it. Three times. It wasn't until the fourth time my name came up again that I thought I might actually be able to finish it. And I did. And it was a lovely, sad, sweet, funny, and ultimately very cheerful book.

If it seems counterintuitive that a book about depression could be perky, then one just hasn't read enough. Jenny Lawson's books are hilarious. Allie Brosh kills. Because the thing is, people who are going through life without challenges don't know how good they have it. They may suspect, they may be legitimately grateful, but they don't have to carefully construct entertainment to distract from the very messy emotions hiding behind the curtain. Humor is an active choice, I'm saying, so I root for anyone who makes that choice, and I praise anyone who makes it look effortless. A dinner party that included the three people would be a marvelous thing, indeed.

I would very much like to read more books by Thomas: I need more of his warmth and humor in my life. Maybe everyone does.

Library copy show less

nonfiction (c2023) - funny autobiographical essays by queer Black humor writer. Not really a memoir (I can't remember if his first book covered more of his life?) but lots of relatable humorous content (on library visits: "it's not hoarding if it's books"), mostly taking place in Baltimore (where he grew up and returned to later in 2017, covering COVID and post-COVID years), with a little in Philadelphia (where he met his white pastor/therapist husband David).

Very relatable humorous personal essays, that do focus a lot of Thomas's time during Covid.