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  • Published: 6 June 2023
  • ISBN: 9781529913040
  • Imprint: Ebury Press
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 128
  • RRP: $17.99

Misfits

A Personal Manifesto – by the creator of 'I May Destroy You'




From the brilliant mind of the creator and star of I May Destroy You and Chewing Gum comes a passionate declaration against fitting in.

THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER - A SUNDAY TIMES FILM & TV BOOK OF THE YEAR

'Razor-sharp and as funny as I May Destroy You ... A gifted writer' Sunday Times | 'A remarkable talent' Guardian | 'A perfect truth-teller of our time' ELLE | 'Leaps off the page' Observer | 'Comic and devastating' New York Times | 'A magnificent thinker' gal-dem | 'A must-read' Metro | 'Your self-help bible' Sunday Times

***A BEST AUTUMN READ in Vogue, Vulture, Time Magazine, Observer, Entertainment Weekly, Bustle and LitHub ***
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From the brilliant mind of the creator and star of I May Destroy You and Chewing Gum comes a passionate declaration against fitting in.

Michaela Coel's MacTaggart Lecture touched a lot of people with her striking revelations about race, class and gender. But in the end, the person most impacted was Coel herself. Building on this speech, Misfits immerses readers in her deeply personal vision through powerful allegory and anecdotes - from her East London upbringing to her discovery of theatre and love for storytelling.

With inspiring insight and wit, she tells of her reckoning with trauma and metamorphosis into a champion for herself, inclusivity and radical honesty, and in telling her journey invites us to reflect on our own. By embracing our differences, she says, we can transform our lives. An artist to her core, Coel holds up the path of the creative as an emblem of our need to regard one another with care and respect - and transparency.

Misfits is a triumphant call for honesty, empathy and inclusion. This timely, necessary book is a rousing coming-to-power manifesto dedicated to anyone who has ever worried about fitting in.

  • Published: 6 June 2023
  • ISBN: 9781529913040
  • Imprint: Ebury Press
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 128
  • RRP: $17.99

Praise for Misfits

Searing ... A call-to-arms book filled with life lessons. Prepare for this to be your self-help bible of 2021

Sunday Times

Her narrative power transcends the small screen. Coel's is a voice that jumps off the page, and it's one we're lucky to have applied to whichever story she chooses to tell

Vogue

By turns wryly comic and devastating ... [Misfits] codifies her efforts to achieve transparency in her work and in her life

Dave Itzkoff, New York Times

Coel makes her literary debut with a slim manifesto written with the same perfect balance of sentiment, insight and wit that made viewers fall in love with her on the screen

Time magazine

Leaps off the page ... [Coel] hits hard: funny, but also direct ... Coel is all about letting go of fear or, at least, of using it to find your way to something better

Miranda Sawyer, Observer

Astute ... Coel is a gifted writer. The text is razor-sharp and as funny as I May Destroy You

Rosie Kinchen, Sunday Times

This short and sharp piece of non-fiction once again shows Michaela Coel as the magnificent thinker she is ... Misfits is profound, hilarious, devastating and breathtakingly beautiful all at once

gal-dem

Warm and funny ... A perfect truth-teller of our time

ELLE

A small book with big ideas that provides revealing snapshots of a career in television from the vantage point of an outsider ... That Coel's original speech didn't bring about an instant revolution in the industry would surely justify its transformation into a book ... A remarkable talent

Fiona Sturges, Guardian

A sharp must-read for misfits everywhere

Sharon Lougher, Metro

A riposte to what society deems as acceptable and how we can make change happen through empathy and a celebration of difference

Francesca Brown, Stylist

Misfits is, to be clear, a manifesto - a statement of values, a call to arms. True to the form, you'll be urging it on people ... Coel's manifesto does not attempt to be comprehensive or systematic, but it's clear on what it wants to do and does it very well ... I suspect it bears the same relation to the sum total of Coel's intellect that The Communist Manifesto does to Marx's. I am very glad both books exist

Naoise Dolan, Irish Times

The work of the writer and actor Michaela Coel is not the kind you linger over, but the kind you swallow in a single gulp ... In Misfits this narrative is given the rhythm and flow of speech; reading, you feel as though you were hearing it live ... a piece of writing that remains as relevant as it is powerful

Sarah Manavis, New Statesman