Home › 2020 Reading Challenges › F**k No! : How to stop saying yes, when you can’t, you shouldn’t, or you just don’t want to, Sarah Knight

F**k No! : How to stop saying yes, when you can’t, you shouldn’t, or you just don’t want to, Sarah Knight

By Printed Pages and Coffee on March 15, 2020 • ( 0 )

Good day my lovelies!

Ok, so, first thing: this was a gift. From my parents. Do you think they might be trying to convey something to me? Because this feels like a commentary…..*squints suspiciously*

Regardless of whether or not the purchase of F**k No! was a commentary on my indecently busy schedule, this was genuinely hilarious. It was also something I think that I, and indeed most people I know, will benefit from having read. Despite how simple the word ‘no’ is to think, many people (myself included) have trouble actually expressing our negation of favours, offers, or requests from whomever may be asking. Have you ever found yourself in the position of listening to yourself say yes to something, agree to something, that the internal screaming inside your head is trying to get you to say ‘no’ to? Against which your entire being rebels?

Yeah, I have, too. So, get this: at the end of the chapters in this book, Ms. Knight has provided templates of what she calls FuckNotes (Fuck No-s. get it?) – with plug-in reasons/names/excuses for what has to be several hundred potential scenarios. And as much as I was cackling throughout the book (genuinely hilarious writing, people), they are actually very useful, very easy to use, and applicable to a wide variety of scenarios (scenari-NOs, according to Ms. Knight). The fact that she has written a literal how-to guide for those of us (and you belong to one of four types of people. Take the test. It’s irritatingly accurate) who need some help figuring out how to say no to all and sundry while not being bitchy about it and still found a way to be funny has made a fan out of me. Not to mention, the titles of her books are crack-up (The series is called No F**ks Given Guides). I want the rest of them now so I can (1) read them all, and (2) sit them on a shelf together and just smile when I see them. Also lend them to people that I think need them (read: aim and fire them like biblio-torpedos).

And if, at the end of this book, you still aren’t sure about when or how to say no to things you can’t, shouldn’t or just don’t want to do? Read the damn thing again. You’ll get there.

Image credit: my photo of my copy of the book.