A candid memoir of self-destruction, writes Marchelle Abrahams.
Cat Marnell is a successful fashion and beauty writer for a top US magazine, or at least she was.
She threw it all away because of her love for drugs, bad boys and more drugs. Yes, we've heard it all before – girl meets boy, girl loses boy and girl meets another boy. In Cat's case it's girl meets ADHD drugs, girl gets hooked on said drugs, girl goes mental and the rest is history.
How To Murder Your Life is not your run-of-the-mill "how I lost my life to drugs" memoir. It's dry, acerbic tone finds the reader rooting for her, willing her to get off her lazy butt and make a go of things.
Somehow you just can't help feeling an affection for her – she's that foul-mouthed drunk friend that's not fit for public consumption because you're scared of her erratic behaviour.
The book stays relevant as Cat touches on popular culture and name drops at certain times (Nev Schulman from MTV's Catfish was her one-time flatmate), but it also delves into the dark side of the ADHD drug culture. It shows how being misdiagnosed could change the course of one person's life; how an obsession can be all-consuming until you're left with absolutely nothing.
Yes, she came from a privileged middle class Washington home, and one can argue that she only had herself to blame, but this book proves that you can have it all and you can still f*ck it up. Cat's story is a work in progress: towards the end of the book she admits that she still craves drugs but taking it one day at a time.
It's a refreshing take on her raw honesty and her willingness to lay her life bare for the world to see.
* How To Murder Your Life by Cat Marnell is available on loot.co.za for R291. You can buy any of the books on this page from loot.co.za by scanning their QR code. You may have to download a QR app on your smartphone.