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It's Okay to Laugh (Crying is Cool Too)
It's Okay to Laugh (Crying is Cool Too): A memoir about loving madly and letting go | Nora McInerny Purmort
'This story will compel you to both laugh and cry, just as the title promises. May we all bring Nora's honesty, passion and hope to our lives' Lena Dunham This isn't a cancer story. It's a love story. Twenty-something Nora bounced from boyfriend to dopey 'boyfriend' until she met Aaron - a charismatic art director and comic-book nerd who made her laugh. When Aaron was diagnosed with a rare form of brain cancer, they refused to let it limit their love. They got engaged on Aaron's hospital bed and had a baby boy while he was on chemo. In the period that followed, Nora and Aaron packed fifty years of marriage into the three they had, spending their time on what really mattered to them: Buffy the Vampire Slayer re-runs, each other and Beyonc. A few months later, Aaron died in Nora's arms. The wildly creative obituary they wrote during Aaron's hospice care touched the hearts of many. With It's Okay to Laugh, Nora puts a young, fresh twist on the subjects of mortality and resilience. What does it actually mean to live your own wild and precious life to the fullest? How can a marriage that contains more sickness than health be so joyful? How do you keep going when life kicks you in the gut? Deeply moving and funny, It's Okay to Laugh is a love letter to life, in all its messy glory.
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RamsFan1963
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Too true!!

#QuotsyJul20 #sundae

@TK-421

sudi This is so accurate 😭 4y
Branwen Yup! 😣 4y
BookmarkTavern Disaster nachos. Yup yup yup. 😟 4y
50 likes3 comments
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mrozzz
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You‘re doing a good job. 👏🏻

I‘ve been somewhat absent, keeping my head down in between the pages of whatever keeps my attention. Hope you‘re all finding good books to get you through. Hang in there. 💕

BarbaraBB You too dear Mel, hope you‘re doing okay over there and have time to enjoy the new house. Things are getting back to normal here but by bit. Let‘s hope we have the worst behind us ❤️ 5y
mrozzz Glad to hear from you @BarbaraBB 💜 Hope you‘re doing equally well! I am crossing along my fingers and toes you‘re right! 5y
Libby1 ❤️⭐️🦋🌈 5y
72 likes3 comments
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EadieB
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Day 9 - #Laugh #SelfImprovementSept #ItsOkayToLaugh #NoraMcInernyPurmort

In this deeply felt and deeply funny memoir, Nora gives her readers a true gift—permission to struggle, permission to laugh, permission to tell the truth and know that everything will be okay. It‘s Okay to Laugh is a love letter to life, in all its messy glory; it reads like a conversation with a close friend, and leaves a trail of glitter in its wake.

Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks ☺️☺️☺️ 5y
OriginalCyn620 👍🏻📚❤️😊 5y
63 likes3 stack adds2 comments
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Sassiekat
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A beautiful bittersweet story told with humour and alot of heart.

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AprilMae
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Life is hard sometimes. Sometimes it's seeing things you wish you had sooner, sometimes is coming to terms with things that you should have sooner. Sometimes you can't help the emotions, sometimes life is hard.

Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks Totally agree ❤️ 5y
Eggs True 5y
Mimi28 Yep! 👍🏽👍🏽❤️❤️ lol 5y
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kaitthegreat
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I‘m not a huge fan of non-fiction writing but Nora‘s unfiltered story-telling made me laugh and cry almost equally in her essays about her love, life, and loss. We would totally be friends if we ever met in real life 😂

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Felso
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Awake and reading this - #24in48 #readathon If only someone would make me a bacon sandwich. Where‘s my house elf?

59 likes1 stack add
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Felso
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Received this today in the mail. Love her podcast “Terrible, thanks for asking”.

WorldsOkayestStepMom Her podcast is one of my favorites. 7y
41 likes1 stack add1 comment
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RachLovesTV
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I seem to have settled into an 11-books-per-month pace over the last few months. This month had less of a theme - I read some books for the #marchmadnesschallenge, one from my #freakyfriday list, and then spent the rest of the month with wedding/royal-themed books, in honor of a certain recent event. 😉

June is going to be a free-for-all, catch-up month, I think: all the books I ran out of time for or didn't fit in precious themes. I can't wait!

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RachLovesTV
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Pickpick

Of all the cancer memoirs I've read recently, this is the first one written by a surviving family member instead of the patient themselves. Nora writes with humor, honestly, and truth about what it's like to lose the ones you love to soon. Beyond just putting in to words some of the things I have been feeling over the past 6 months, though, Nora gives great advice and insight in how to be a good friend to your own people who are grieving.

SledgeReader @RachLovesTV This being a topic that has touched my family too many times, my heart swells for you and others with the broad spectrum of associated feelings. Peace. 7y
RachLovesTV Thank you, @SledgeReader, your words are greatly appreciated. 7y
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AprilMae
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Happy Easter weekend everyone! My weekend goals are:
✔Laundry (boring but important for work lol)
✔Being the Easter bunny and dropping of some Easter Baskets
✔ Finishing at least one of these two books!!!
✔ Relaxing

How about you guys? Big plans? #litsyontheweekend

LoveToReadLiveToRead I‘m sharing some of your plans.....laundry! 🧦👚👖 Its never ending! I would like to finish a book too but I don‘t think that‘s going to happen. Happy Easter! 7y
19 likes1 comment
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AprilMae
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My #MountTBRReadathon list includes already started books only so far! Let's do this!!!!

RaimeyGallant Me too. Got through one today! 7y
YouReadMyEyes Me three 👋🏼 7y
21 likes2 comments
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AprilMae
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"The only thing I know for sure is that it is okay not to know everything, to try and to fail and to sometimes suck at life, as long as you try to get better"

Someone recomended this to me. I don't know if I'm ready for it or not.?

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Tanzy13
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"I am creating my own path through my own grief, toward my own version of happiness."

SheReadsAndWrites Beautiful photo ♥️ 7y
102 likes1 stack add2 comments
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Tanzy13
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"Happiness isn‘t something that is handed to you, but something you have a hand in making, every day."

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KaitiWinchell
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Pickpick

This book had me laughing and crying constantly. I love it so much. I really love Nora's sense of humor.

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HardcoverHarlot
Pickpick

Absolutely wonderful. Perfect #readathon book, too, because the essay chapters are so short.

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HardcoverHarlot
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Book number 2 for the #readathon. I think it‘ll go faster than the first.

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tholmz
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The only negative thing I have to say is I wish this was a fluent memoir and not a series of essays. Nora's story is so heartbreaking and real and her voice is so open and hilarious that I would have loved to read something congruent. Other than that, even WITH that, I loved it.

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ashlinisme
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Pickpick

So. The man I love is dying of cancer. Like, right now. I feel confused, hopeless, impotent.

I devour books about living with cancer, coping with emotions, life changes, emotional intelligence, etc. But they don't tell me what to do. How do I cope with the loss of our future? How do I react? Why is breathing hard? What do I do when all I want to do is cry?

This book was different...

More at missashlin.blogspot.com

*Excuse misspelling on image*

Cinfhen Sending you love and hugs...sorry for what you are going through 💔 8y
leslieisreading ❤️❤️ 8y
tholmz So much love to you. 7y
ashlinisme Thanks @tholmz It was one of the hardest things I've ever done. 7y
tholmz @ashlinisme I can't imagine. Not sure if well wishes from a stranger mean anything, but you have all of the ones I can muster. ❤️ 7y
7 likes5 comments
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ashlinisme
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And this, for some strange reason, is the moment when I lost it. I cried for Nora and Ralph and Aaron and myself. And it was beautiful and it hurt, but I felt the hope creeping in. I felt peace.

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ashlinisme
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They didn't know what to do.

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ashlinisme
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Did I sing both sides of the Meat Loaf hit "Anything for Love"? Yes, yes I did. ?

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ashlinisme
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I was courteous enough to leave them a healthy digital bread crumb trail... 😄

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ashlinisme
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He's a marine at heart, still, stoic and strong and not about to be a bother to anybody. 😭

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ashlinisme
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That's another marine/Dad thing. #true

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ashlinisme
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Yes. And probably more than you ever thought you could.

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ashlinisme
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"I will cry in my dorm room and wonder if love is even real." ???

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ashlinisme
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I'm simultaneously excited by and terrified of this book. #exciterrified

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ashlinisme
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Weekend reading. I'll finish what I can.

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CaringLoudly
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This passage is super relevant to my current situation .

TsundokuAleax I think I needed that too. Also we need to figure out a hang out day. 8y
8 likes1 comment
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CaringLoudly
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"That's why we're uncomfortable with crying: because it's literally having your feelings leak out of you."
Nora McInerny's quote about crying is one of my absolute favorites. I can't wait to read this. (I've also always said if I write a memoir, it would be called "Laughing While Crying" so this title speaks to me!)

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kimthedork
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Pickpick

In 2014, Nora McInerny Purmort lost both her father and her husband to cancer after she miscarried her second baby. This book, more a series of essays than a memoir, is the first thing I read after Nate died that made profound grief make any sense to me. She shows grief can be darkly funny, that you need to find people who can see both the laughter and the loss, and who can be there as you try to put back together your wild and precious life.

BethFishReads Whoa -- sounds like something I should read 8y
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BethwithBooks
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It might be a little early to call ... as there is still a whole month left ... but this is my pick of the year. 2016 was a weird one and this book was everything I didn't know I needed. Nonfiction for the win.

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Matilda
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When your goat dog insistently barks over your audiobook to show you a turtle laying eggs.

ErickaS_Flyleafunfurled That's so cool! (I hope the football isnt the father) 8y
Matilda @ErickaS_Flyleafunfurled.com 😂 or that could make some super interesting Shaped turtles! 🐢🏈 8y
Suzze Very neat! 8y
See All 6 Comments
LeahBergen 😮😮 8y
lute I'd forgive the dog for that. Pretty cool thing to see! 8y
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SarahK
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Pickpick

Nora lost both her father and husband within weeks of one another and suffered a miscarriage at the same time. Some of the essays in this book are funny, some are serious, and some are sort of self-helpy. She is really relatable and my heart broke for what she went through. Overall I enjoyed the book.

thegirlwiththelibrarybag Yikes, that's quite the bundle of misfortune. 8y
ReadingEnvy Wow one at a time would be bad enough 8y
17 likes2 comments
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JennyM
Pickpick

This book got to me.
Nora is funny and you will laugh a lot, yet the rawness of her grief left me weeping.
A timely reminder to love those around you and enjoy your 'one wild and precious life'.

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KerriArista
Pickpick

I loved loved loved this audiobook. It really does make you laugh and cry... Sometimes ur crying because it's sad, but often, because it's so sweet and heartfelt. My favorite memoir I've "read" in a long time. I highly recommend listening to the author read it... You end up feeling like ur friends with her?

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Queenofeverything4
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Starting now.

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DarthDeadpool
Pickpick

3.5/5 stars. It made me laugh a little, and made me tear up quite a bit. Sometimes it gets repetitive, though, and seems like blog posts meant to be read days or weeks apart instead of one after another in book format. I enjoyed it overall, though, and would recommend picking it up.

tholmz Totally agree with this! I wish it had been fluent and not so piece-y. 7y
3 likes1 comment
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DarthDeadpool
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Less than 100 pages in and I've already teared up several times, and had a few laughs, too.

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jordanerickson
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Pickpick

This was sad and I really enjoyed it

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BethwithBooks
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Pickpick

Sad and funny and beautiful. I stayed up until 3am on a work night to finish - which is about as good a review of a book as I can give.

5 likes2 stack adds
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BethwithBooks

When the dust jacket makes you cry ... Off to a good start!

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BethwithBooks
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Book I am most excited to read post BEA. I love me a humorous memoir even if the story is sad, here's hoping it lives up to they hype I have created in my own head 😜

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continuants
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Pickpick

Must. Read. So many feelings. Nora's writing is beautiful and makes you feel like you're just hanging out with her and she's telling you her life story, everything from the lighthearted to the gravely serious.

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continuants
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Very excited to start reading this. Thank you @RachelFersh!