Dear Girls

Ali Wong

Image | Book Cover: Dear Girls by Ali Wong

(Random House)

In her hit Netflix comedy special Baby Cobra, an eight-month pregnant Ali Wong resonated so strongly that she even became a popular Halloween costume. Wong told the world her remarkably unfiltered thoughts on marriage, sex, Asian culture, working women and why you never see new mom comics on stage but you sure see plenty of new dads.
The sharp insights and humour are even more personal in this completely original collection. She shares the wisdom she's learned from a life in comedy and reveals stories from her life off stage, including the brutal single life in New York (i.e. the inevitable confrontation with erectile dysfunction), reconnecting with her roots (and drinking snake blood) in Vietnam, tales of being a wild child growing up in San Francisco and parenting war stories. Though addressed to her daughters, Ali Wong's letters are absurdly funny, surprisingly moving, and enlightening (and gross) for all. (From Random House)

From the book

Chapter 1: How I Trapped Your Father

Dear Girls,

Your dad is the (if we are divorced by the time you read this, please skip to the next sentence) best, but I didn't just find him overnight. In the fall of 2009, I had been living in NYC for a year and had been unlucky when it came to love and casual sex.

Well, let's just get right to it: I dated a series of men who had issues getting it up. It felt like a curse. Five guys in a row lost their boners in the middle of getting busy. Part of me blamed the Raynaud's disease, a condition that was passed on to me by my father. I have extremely poor circulation to my hands and feet, to the point where in the cold, they will turn blue and feel like pain icicles. So, especially in the New York fall or wintertime, my bare hands, much like the hands of Rogue from the X-Men, could suck the life out of a man's erect penis.

After the first two guys that I hooked up with in NYC went soft on me, I grew extremely self-conscious of my White Walker fingers. By the third time I started making out with a new guy, I made sure to simultaneously warm my hands up by furiously rubbing them together and breathing into them like a homeless character in a theater production, next to a papier mâché trash-can fire.

From Dear Girls by Ali Wong ©2019. Published by Random House.

Interviews with Ali Wong

Media Audio | Q : Ali Wong warns subversive Baby Cobra is 'not a TED talk'

Caption: Comic and TV writer Ali Wong presents a tough-talking, dirty-minded view of feminism, motherhood and more in her popular Netflix special, Baby Cobra.

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