This Is Not About You: A Menmoir by Rosemary Mac Cabe. No Advance Reader Copy included. No affiliate links used. Read my full disclosure policy here.
My physical copy of This Is Not About You hasn’t arrived yet. So, when the publisher, Unbound, emailed to say that the paperback copy I pledged for included the ebook, I downloaded it yesterday, thinking, ‘I’ll read a few chapters and then finish it during the week when the book turns up.’ Many hours later, stopping just long enough to make a sandwich, I inhaled each chapter finding myself at the end much quicker than I anticipated.
Described in the blurb as a menmoir about ‘dating and romance, or lack thereof – from one terrible man to the next’, Rosemary states in the opening chapter ‘, This book is not about them, though, not really. It’s about me: how I made and unmade myself for each of them.’ Mac Cabe sets the scene for an exploration of what it means to lose yourself, find yourself, lose yourself again, and find and rebuild yourself once more. Yes, the story is told through the lens of a series of relationships with men — some long-term, some short(ish)-term, and some not even reaching relationship status — but this is a story of self-discovery and what it means to be human, with all the messiness that entails.
This Is Not About You is written with Mac Cabe’s characteristic warmth, humour, and vulnerability. It is as enjoyable as you’d expect if you are familiar with Rosemary’s work. But Mac Cabe’s writing style is so engaging that readers coming to her work for the first time will also be sucked into this entertaining tale of figuring out who the fuck you are. Which is at the heart of the memoir.
It is almost cliche to say that a book made you ‘laugh and cry’, but This Is Not About You did. I laughed. I cried. I cringed. In examining these relationships, Rosemary holds a mirror up to herself as much as the men involved and has no qualms in admitting when she got things wrong or behaved in ways she wouldn’t if she got the chance to relive those moments.
I marvelled at Rosemary's balance between sharing lighter dating moments and the more serious experiences that could not have been easy to write about. I also deeply appreciated the care Mac Cabe took in writing about the men involved and acknowledging that while these are her stories as she experienced them, she cannot know for sure how the men in question viewed things. This care is particularly evident during the chapter about Johnny and how his alcohol addiction affected their relationship and Rosemary’s relationships with her closest friends.
Personal non-fiction and life writing are my favourite genres, so I read a lot of memoirs. This Is Not About You is among the best of them. It has earned a place in my favourite books of the year, so I’ll be raving about it again in my end-of-year wrap-up.
This Is Not About You: A Menmoir by Rosemary Mac Cabe is published by Unbound and is available in paperback and ebook formats.
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