I'm Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself

Praise

One of W Magazine’s Best, Most Talked-About Books of 2024

“A journey of radical pleasure filled with good friends, good food, good wine, and good sex. . . . MacNicol finds purposeful, decadent joy beyond the confines of society’s expectations.”
—W Magazine

“In I’m Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself, Glynnis MacNicol brilliantly cements her writing legacy as the most ardent supporter of living well, especially for women, amid any and all pressure to suppress our natural exhilaration for being alive. MacNicol’s memoir is a guide for pursuing your own pleasure in body and spirit, not exactly an example for readers to follow, but certainly an invitation to allow themselves all the same freedoms. This isn’t escapism. This is a call to go deeper into what feels most real.”
—Ashley C. Ford, New York Times bestselling author of Somebody’s Daughter
 
“I thought I knew pleasure when I met my husband. But reading this book makes me think I should’ve stayed single in Paris! Finally a model of womanhood beyond kids and marriage, a vision of what it can be to embrace freedom. Every word was a pleasure.”
—Katy Tur, anchor of MSNBC’s Katy Tur Reports and New York Times bestselling author of Rough Draft and Unbelievable
 
“Absolutely triumphant. A rapturous ode to loving yourself through letting others love you, I’m Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself by Glynnis MacNicol is a decadent buffet of pleasures that adds up to so much more. MacNicol takes us on a Seine-backdropped, art-and-bicycle-packed adventure that goes beyond self-discovery or acceptance, and to a deeper place of real self-love. A beautiful, bold, boisterous literary book for those of us who are longing to be touched—the ones who want to pursue the best life has to offer us, and nothing less.”
—Isaac Fitzgerald, New York Times bestselling author of Dirtbag, Massachusetts

“In the impermeable narrative that society has given women about getting older, MacNicol has opened a trap door to a world of pleasures, parties, and power. Her lively, succulent account of seeking joy for the hell of it in Paris is a permanent permission slip for all of us to find it for ourselves, right here, at any age. My highest praise for this book is ‘I enjoyed it so much!!’ because that’s exactly what MacNicol is teaching us to do in all parts of our lives.”
—Mari Andrew, New York Times bestselling author of Am I There Yet? and My Inner Sky

“Jubilant . . . After spending the height of the Covid-19 pandemic anxious and alone in her New York City apartment, a 47-year-old MacNicol jumped at the opportunity to sublet a friend’s Paris apartment in 2021. She was eager for a change of scenery and an opportunity to live as ‘a woman who wasn’t required to ask permission. Who could do as she pleased.’ In Paris, MacNicol ate indulgently, found lovers via dating apps, made new friends, and eventually came to view the city as ‘a mirror that has allowed me to see my entire self and . . . tak[e] enormous pleasure in the wholeness of that person.’ . . . It adds up to an exhilarating account of finding a new lease of life.”
—Publishers Weekly

“Women today are expected to know and be everything, but at what cost? Are your 20s the only acceptable age to grow and evolve? These are only some of the questions MacNicol brings to the table, as she challenges modern expectations of the right to pleasure and enjoyment and being one’s true self in an ever-darkening world. Blending humorous commentary and wit with vivid stories of love, lust, and good food, MacNicol generously invites readers into her Parisian paradise. A fun memoir filled to the brim with humor and vulnerability.”
—Kirkus