Here is a list of the absolute worst reviews I go to in my mind if I want to mentally self harm. They’re all from strangers. People who know you well don’t count (they’ve been looking at you too closely for way too long, how can they possibly see the real you?) Only a complete stranger can, from their distance, view the pointillist painting of your failings. So, in no particular order:
1. Strangers on Amazon whose only other review when you go to their profile is of a kitchen appliance they also thought was shit. Did they write both reviews in one bad day? Did they hate my novel and then try to vacuum away their displeasure and that was subpar, too? Or did they hate their new vacuum and need the sweet release of being transported to an interesting new world, the way a book can, only to become further activated?
2. Older woman cashier who wordlessly followed me and my mother around a sample sale, trailing us up and down the aisles of the church hall, as if we were fat and would steal things and as if our weight had some bearing on our theft.
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