What do you think?
Rate this book
The Gloomy Girl Variety Show: A Memoir
Merging memoir, poetry, and criticism, this radical literary revue traces a first-generation Nigerian American’s search for home and belonging on her own terms.
In three parts, The Gloomy Girl Variety Show traces the joys and despairs of an imaginary house hunt. Author Freda Epum takes the real-life housing inequity she encounters and spins it into a sprawling meditation on the larger cost of living and enduring as a Black disabled woman in America. Brick by brick, and despite the difficulties she faces, Epum creates space for women, people of color, people with disabilities, children of immigrants, and anyone else who has felt “in-between.”
In this formally inventive memoir woven with essays, poems, and images, Epum explores the opposing forces of her “no-place, no-where” identity. As a Nigerian American daughter who spent years in and out of institutions while she sought treatment for life-threatening mental illness, Epum examines her journey through healthcare and housing systems via a pop cultural our collective obsession with HGTV’s home buying and makeover shows.
With raw honesty and a wry sense of humor, The Gloomy Girl Variety Show explores the complexity of coming of age under intersecting forms of oppression, and reveals what it takes to come back from the brink of despair and arrive somewhere safe, beautiful, and empowering.
In three parts, The Gloomy Girl Variety Show traces the joys and despairs of an imaginary house hunt. Author Freda Epum takes the real-life housing inequity she encounters and spins it into a sprawling meditation on the larger cost of living and enduring as a Black disabled woman in America. Brick by brick, and despite the difficulties she faces, Epum creates space for women, people of color, people with disabilities, children of immigrants, and anyone else who has felt “in-between.”
In this formally inventive memoir woven with essays, poems, and images, Epum explores the opposing forces of her “no-place, no-where” identity. As a Nigerian American daughter who spent years in and out of institutions while she sought treatment for life-threatening mental illness, Epum examines her journey through healthcare and housing systems via a pop cultural our collective obsession with HGTV’s home buying and makeover shows.
With raw honesty and a wry sense of humor, The Gloomy Girl Variety Show explores the complexity of coming of age under intersecting forms of oppression, and reveals what it takes to come back from the brink of despair and arrive somewhere safe, beautiful, and empowering.
- GenresMemoirNonfiction
231 pages, Kindle Edition
Published January 14, 2025
3 people are currently reading
297 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
February 8, 2025
I received a copy of this book from the feminist press in exchange for a review. In no way has this impacted my rating.
Trigger warnings for The Gloomy Girl Variety Show: Suicidal ideation
This memoir is told through what I felt were vignettes of memory that wove through the confusion of a 2nd generation Nigerian daughter, grappling with the wants many of us have. Home to feel safe in, hearth to decompress by and hearts that welcome us home. Epum processes the American dream through watching wealthy individuals on HGTV house hunting/renovation specials. The house is a physical manifestation of so much more.
Epum carefully uses postmodernist art to exemplify disability, toxic societal expectations of women and intimacy. If you are an art nerd like me, you are going to have a grand old time. Epum slowly divulges her dark emotions; partially impacted by parental relationships, past boyfriends and a sense of imposter syndrome. Anyone who has struggled in the job market in the past few years will be able to relate to the struggle to stay afloat.
Despite the darkness she expresses in waves throughout the book, I found myself laughing out loud at interspersed lines of wit or observation. People with trauma, in my experience, tend to make the best comedians. Finding the bit comes naturally as a coping mechanism, which left me questioning during moments like this- "It seemed they thought the crazies didn't need shea butter" I asked myself, should I be laughing? I highly recommend this if you are looking for a raw and real exploration of in-betweenness, black identity, and whether an art degree is still a good idea. My vote is yes.
Trigger warnings for The Gloomy Girl Variety Show: Suicidal ideation
This memoir is told through what I felt were vignettes of memory that wove through the confusion of a 2nd generation Nigerian daughter, grappling with the wants many of us have. Home to feel safe in, hearth to decompress by and hearts that welcome us home. Epum processes the American dream through watching wealthy individuals on HGTV house hunting/renovation specials. The house is a physical manifestation of so much more.
Epum carefully uses postmodernist art to exemplify disability, toxic societal expectations of women and intimacy. If you are an art nerd like me, you are going to have a grand old time. Epum slowly divulges her dark emotions; partially impacted by parental relationships, past boyfriends and a sense of imposter syndrome. Anyone who has struggled in the job market in the past few years will be able to relate to the struggle to stay afloat.
Despite the darkness she expresses in waves throughout the book, I found myself laughing out loud at interspersed lines of wit or observation. People with trauma, in my experience, tend to make the best comedians. Finding the bit comes naturally as a coping mechanism, which left me questioning during moments like this- "It seemed they thought the crazies didn't need shea butter" I asked myself, should I be laughing? I highly recommend this if you are looking for a raw and real exploration of in-betweenness, black identity, and whether an art degree is still a good idea. My vote is yes.
January 27, 2025
Freda Epum's honest, fizzy, and sparkling memoir deals with messy life; she's not afraid to dive into its gory intestines. She describes the great highs and lows of grappling with growing up Black in a majority white area (in the US, in Tucson, Arizona), with coming of age, mental illness, unemployment and underemployment, and then finally, happily, making a life of her own. Among her musings, switching between first- and third-person (and occasionally second-): her relationship with her parents, and also with food; longing for home, that loaded idea and freighted concept (*“I am without my own definition of home,”* she says); identity, and her pain from the sense of dislocation as a third culture kid (learning to mispronounce her surname for the comfort of those around her, and: *“I resented my parents, grateful for their sacrifice but bitter about what I’d been deprived of: a sense of self”*).
She considers language:
*”During one of my literature classes in graduate school, we read Nnedi Okorafor’s Who Fears Death. I sit across from a friend who speed-reads the first twenty chapters in two hours. Meanwhile I’ve only reached chapter ten or so. I don’t tell my friend that I struggle to read the names of the Nigerian characters. I go syllable by syllable, making sure to pronounce them the way my dad would in his thick accent—though it’s waned after thirty years spent in the United States. I often tell people how I wish I, too, had an accent where I call for my “bruddah” to bring up a bowl of nsala soup from downstairs.”*
She remembers and relates admissions to hospital for mental healthcare, and sessions with therapists and psychiatrists. She ponders expectations of motherhood (*“Will they, too, suffer from mental illness?”*). She talks about the burden of capitalism, and about art; includes a stellar essay on “Corpsing,” performance, social death, and “terminal Blackness”; and, finally, she tells us about how she finds love.
The central idea in *The Gloomy Girl Variety Show* is a longing for home. Epum shares a wishlist at the start of the book (“A fully furnished home with a great stove to cook family recipes, large windows to look out at the landscape, a couch to fall asleep on, a bed to lie in for hours, a bathtub to soak my pain away”), and ends the book with a description of the first home she owns. In-between is the existential search.
Epum may self-identify as a gloomy girl, and I will respect that, but she feels like she’d be really cool to hang out with—as we get to do here. This memoir is lively, sometimes sad, and always vulnerable; Epum comes across as upbeat, if somewhat wry. Her creativity with structure is a delight: from simple memoir, to poetry, a play script, essays, photographs, and art reviews. Importantly, *The Gloomy Girl Variety Show* is about Epum’s experience as a first generation Nigerian-American woman, a Black/African child of immigrants. It's a raw, beautiful, and deep work.
Grateful thanks to The Feminist Press and to Edelweiss for early access.
She considers language:
*”During one of my literature classes in graduate school, we read Nnedi Okorafor’s Who Fears Death. I sit across from a friend who speed-reads the first twenty chapters in two hours. Meanwhile I’ve only reached chapter ten or so. I don’t tell my friend that I struggle to read the names of the Nigerian characters. I go syllable by syllable, making sure to pronounce them the way my dad would in his thick accent—though it’s waned after thirty years spent in the United States. I often tell people how I wish I, too, had an accent where I call for my “bruddah” to bring up a bowl of nsala soup from downstairs.”*
She remembers and relates admissions to hospital for mental healthcare, and sessions with therapists and psychiatrists. She ponders expectations of motherhood (*“Will they, too, suffer from mental illness?”*). She talks about the burden of capitalism, and about art; includes a stellar essay on “Corpsing,” performance, social death, and “terminal Blackness”; and, finally, she tells us about how she finds love.
The central idea in *The Gloomy Girl Variety Show* is a longing for home. Epum shares a wishlist at the start of the book (“A fully furnished home with a great stove to cook family recipes, large windows to look out at the landscape, a couch to fall asleep on, a bed to lie in for hours, a bathtub to soak my pain away”), and ends the book with a description of the first home she owns. In-between is the existential search.
Epum may self-identify as a gloomy girl, and I will respect that, but she feels like she’d be really cool to hang out with—as we get to do here. This memoir is lively, sometimes sad, and always vulnerable; Epum comes across as upbeat, if somewhat wry. Her creativity with structure is a delight: from simple memoir, to poetry, a play script, essays, photographs, and art reviews. Importantly, *The Gloomy Girl Variety Show* is about Epum’s experience as a first generation Nigerian-American woman, a Black/African child of immigrants. It's a raw, beautiful, and deep work.
Grateful thanks to The Feminist Press and to Edelweiss for early access.
December 6, 2024
The Gloomy Girl Variety Show by Freda Epum was one of my most anticipated memoirs for 2025 and it did not disappoint. It is sharp, it is clever, and it will linger on your mind long after you finish reading.
"No matter my current place of residence, my identities follow me. I've told you I'm searching, that I'm on the market for belonging."
Framing her story within an HGTV-style house hunt, Epum explores themes of belonging and "home" in her mind, her family, and a world that is increasingly hostile towards people living at the intersection of multiple systems of oppression.
The Gloomy Girl Variety Show reads less like a traditional memoir with a continuous narrative and more of a collection of poems, short stories, and brief insights into Epum's brain as she details her experiences growing up as a first-generation Nigerian American, navigating adolescence in a very white Arizona, coping with and being treated for life-threatening mental illness, existing in this world as a disabled Black woman, and more.
I really appreciated the way Epum weaves in academic articles, news clippings, works of art, and other external sources that inspired her and/or informed her narrative. They really round out and enhance the pictures she is trying to paint in this work.
There was something to discover on every page, so much that I went through an entire stack of sticky notes trying to flag all of the parts I want to revisit.
I wholeheartedly recommend pre-ordering this book or requesting it from your library so you can read it as soon as it releases on 1/14/25!
"No matter my current place of residence, my identities follow me. I've told you I'm searching, that I'm on the market for belonging."
Framing her story within an HGTV-style house hunt, Epum explores themes of belonging and "home" in her mind, her family, and a world that is increasingly hostile towards people living at the intersection of multiple systems of oppression.
The Gloomy Girl Variety Show reads less like a traditional memoir with a continuous narrative and more of a collection of poems, short stories, and brief insights into Epum's brain as she details her experiences growing up as a first-generation Nigerian American, navigating adolescence in a very white Arizona, coping with and being treated for life-threatening mental illness, existing in this world as a disabled Black woman, and more.
I really appreciated the way Epum weaves in academic articles, news clippings, works of art, and other external sources that inspired her and/or informed her narrative. They really round out and enhance the pictures she is trying to paint in this work.
There was something to discover on every page, so much that I went through an entire stack of sticky notes trying to flag all of the parts I want to revisit.
I wholeheartedly recommend pre-ordering this book or requesting it from your library so you can read it as soon as it releases on 1/14/25!
Read
December 18, 2025I sat with this on a Sunday afternoon and it has stayed with me since then. It is my first read of Freda Epum's and it will not be my last. She is a Nigerian-American writer who navigates social anxiety, psychotic depression, complex PTSD, generalized anxiety disorder, an eating disorder, and panic disorder with agoraphobia. I am so appreciative of her generosity, sincerity, and bravery in so powerfully illustrating such a poignant picture of her lived experience.
Epum comments on mental health, the treatment of Black bodies in America, healthcare, housing, and more through poetry and photography. I zoomed through it, but then came back to certain passages that were searingly candid, or viscerally heartbreaking and infuriating.
Epum comments on mental health, the treatment of Black bodies in America, healthcare, housing, and more through poetry and photography. I zoomed through it, but then came back to certain passages that were searingly candid, or viscerally heartbreaking and infuriating.
January 11, 2025
The Gloomy Girl Variety Show is a brilliant book to begin the year—a collage of short essays, experimental pieces and even a short play—that tell honest stories of home and agency of self. Epum twists the memoir genre in the way I like best, incorporating an autotheory approach that uses quotes, research, and lived experience alongside each other to make theory of her life. She allows us to sit inside the shadows of anxiety and depression, to recount microagressions that discourage agency and wellness, as well as how she uses writing, art, and expression to honor her aliveness. I felt belonging in these pages and I think you will too.
January 6, 2025
This was such a unique and captivating read, and Freda Epum did an exceptional job painting a picture of her thoughts and experiences as a first-generation Nigerian American woman struggling with issues of identity and mental health. I loved this book for its eclectic style of bite-sized episodes mixed with poetry, artwork, quotes, citations, and even a partial egusi recipe. This book will keep me pondering over it for quite some time, and I highly recommend grabbing a copy! Many thanks to Feminist Press for providing me with an advance review copy.
July 17, 2025
his book is diamonded, rich with photos, social criticism, poetry, memoir, all in sharp vignettes. And it’s just so beautifully honest. From her search to define home for herself as Nigerian American, to her experiences with disability, police brutality, microaggressions, & the glaring inequalities of the American healthcare system for Black women, Epum creates a unique book that also feels like an art installation. There are so many things to admire about The Gloomy Girl Variety Show, but one of the things I admire most is her frankness about her mental health journey. Such power.
October 30, 2024
The Gloomy Girl Variety Show by Freda Epum truly lives up to its name, offering a vibrant mix of themes such as romance, mental illness, identity, racism, immigration, and more. It has a little dark humor and a whole lot of raw truth. This one was hard to put down, so I read it in one sitting. It's that good! Thank you, Feminist Press, for the ARC.
February 18, 2025
The first thing I’ll say: it stays with you. I deeply appreciate the vulnerability of such a piece; the ways in which Epum opens us to the realities of living with mental illness and living as a Black woman in America. Necessary. Eloquent. A book this country needs right now.
June 9, 2025
This is an amazing book written in fragments with art and reflections and house hunters and mental illness and the immigrant experience. Just amazing. (Also funny.) Highly recommend!
November 14, 2025
Had to read this for school and it was really good! Beautifully articulated what it is like living with a major mental illness. Got a look into the intersectionality of blackness and disability.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews