"More concerned with brutal honesty than keeping up appearances, [Harrington] bares all in frank prose covering everything from senior pictures to her deep-seated desire for more family fights—and isn’t afraid to dish it out, either. Required reading for Mother’s Day (and every subsequent day after) is her piece demanding that mothers be given more than one day each year to be celebrated."

— Ms. Magazine

“Amateur Hour finds Kimberly Harrington as funny, cutting, honest, and brilliant as ever.”

— Christopher Monks, Editor of McSweeney’s Internet Tendency and author of The Ultimate Game Guide to Your Life

"Amateur Hour careens from the hilarious to the poignant, eliciting nods of recognition, fists of outrage and many moments of bemusement and reflection. If your throat isn’t constricted, heart not cracked by the end of it, you may consider checking if you have a pulse… if the pitch-perfect book title strikes a chord with you, most of the essays will, too. It’s a balm knowing you’re not the only one on the roller coaster."

— Associated Press

“Amateur Hour is a feisty, arresting collection of essays that bring intimate laughter and tears often in the same breath. In a world of endless mommy tell-alls that feel like the literary equivalent of house chardonnay, this is top-shelf whiskey.”

— Electric Literature

"Selling this book as a book about motherhood would sell it short. Rather, it is a meditation on a full, beautiful, and messy life. In her first book, Harrington, a contributor to the New Yorker and McSweeney’s, writes about being a woman in her twenties, thirties, and forties; about being a working woman, wife, and mother; about being a person who struggles daily with anxiety and worry for her future, her death, her children’s safety, and her marriage. No piece in this collection of short vignettes is much like another. Chapters will make readers rotate through laughter, tears, and cringing, and are all written with refreshingly honest and bold abandon."

— Booklist

“Kimberly Harrington deftly and hilariously uncovers all of the lies and bullshit women are told about motherhood. This book made me laugh, sure, but it also made me feel seen."

— Jennifer Romolini, author of Weird in a World That's Not

"Amateur Hour careens from the hilarious to the poignant, eliciting nods of recognition, fists of outrage and many moments of bemusement and reflection. If your throat isn’t constricted, heart not cracked by the end of it, you may consider checking if you have a pulse… if the pitch-perfect book title strikes a chord with you, most of the essays will, too. It’s a balm knowing you’re not the only one on the roller coaster."

— Associated Press