I'm Telling the Truth, But I'm Lying: Essays

I'm Telling the Truth, But I'm Lying: EssaysINSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER In I'm Telling the Truth, but I'm Lying Bassey Ikpi explores her life as a Nigerian American immigrant, a black woman, a slam poet, a mother, a daughter, an artist through the lens of her mental health and diagnosis of bipolar II and anxiety. Her remarkable memoir in essays implodes our preconceptions of the mind and normalcy as Bassey bares her own truths and lies for us all to behold with radical honesty and brutal

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

In I'm Telling the Truth, but I'm Lying Bassey Ikpi explores her life--as a Nigerian-American immigrant, a black woman, a slam poet, a mother, a daughter, an artist--through the lens of her mental health and diagnosis of bipolar II and anxiety. Her remarkable memoir in essays implodes our preconceptions of the mind and normalcy as Bassey bares her own truths and lies for us all to behold with radical honesty and brutal intimacy.

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We will not think or talk about mental health or normalcy the same after reading this momentous art object moonlighting as a colossal collection of essays." --Kiese Laymon, author of Heavy

From her early childhood in Nigeria through her adolescence in Oklahoma, Bassey Ikpi lived with a tumult of emotions, cycling between extreme euphoria and deep depression--sometimes within the course of a single day. By the time she was in her early twenties, Bassey was a spoken word artist and traveling with HBO's Def Poetry Jam, channeling her life into art. But beneath the fa ade of the confident performer, Bassey's mental health was in a precipitous decline, culminating in a breakdown that resulted in hospitalization and a diagnosis of Bipolar II.

In I'm Telling the Truth, But I'm Lying, Bassey Ikpi breaks open our understanding of mental health by giving us intimate access to her own. Exploring shame, confusion, medication, and family in the process, Bassey looks at how mental health impacts every aspect of our lives--how we appear to others, and more importantly to ourselves--and challenges our preconception about what it means to be normal. Viscerally raw and honest, the result is an exploration of the stories we tell ourselves to make sense of who we are--and the ways, as honest as we try to be, each of these stories can also be a lie.

--Caroline Kepnes, author of You and Hidden Bodies

Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Published: 08/20/2019
ISBN: 9780062698346
Pages: 272
Weight: 0.44lbs
Size: 7.90h x 5.30w x 0.60d

Review Citations: Library Journal Prepub Alert 03/01/2019 pg. 95
Library Journal 06/01/2019 pg. 109
Publishers Weekly 06/03/2019
Kirkus Reviews 06/15/2019
Booklist 07/01/2019 pg. 14