Book Review: ‘This Is Not A Book About Benedict Cumberbatch: The Joy of Loving Something–Anything–Like Your Life Depends on It’

What are you obsessed with? If you’re anything like us, you have something or someone that you are obsessed with. For us, it’s a lot of different things – hence having a website about fandom. But one thing, for this writer personally, that hasn’t been on my list of obsessions is Benedict Cumberbatch.

Sometimes though, when you look at obsessions through another persons eyes, you grow an appreciation for what you took for granted before.

While I admit, that when I was approached about This Is Not A Book About Benedict Cumberbatch, I honestly thought that I was going to dive into a book that I would make fun of. My savageness was ready to peak.

But as with a lot of things in life, I was wrong. My savageness was in deed not ready to peak. It was bitch slapped into submission with words that were woven together so seamlessly that I felt the need to be like Baby’s Daddy in Dirty Dancing and say I was wrong.

“When I am wrong, I say i’m wrong.”

What I was reading in these pageswas a testament to the way I am in life, passionate and afraid of admitting it. Try telling people you own a website about fandom. The looks on their faces as a response to what I do in life has always made me afraid to admit what is.

But this book made me want to lean out my window (I can’t though cause it’s off the track) and scream about the joy that I find in things that people will tell me that I am too old for.

After the past few years, I think we have all thought about what brings us joy and fewer of us have thought about Benedict Cumberbatch. But, I as I flipped through the pages of this book, I realized that this book was speaking to me, about me, and so many other women I know.

Caravan is a talented writer who is able to weave together words in a way that lifts you up, makes you embrace who you are, and grabs a hold of your soul, reminding you that life is worth living and not existing through. She reminds you that joy is not a dirty word, it’s something that we should take in as easily as the air we breathe.

As I flipped through pages, I found myself laughing, crying, and realizing that in our lives a lot of people may try to tell you who you should be. They will continue that with what you should be. But Caravan explored fandom and the areas of it that people may not understand, don’t see, and just how strong it can be.

And she also explored the question what would happen if we lived our lives following our interests and not being ashamed of the things we love. What if as women we didn’t find shame in things we’re supposed to have grown out of and really embrace that shit.

Life would be a lot different. Life would be a lot better. Just because we get older doesn’t mean that we need to release ourselves from our obsessions and passions. If anything, it means that we need to hang onto them more.

As we get older, we don’t need to loose what is a fundamental part of who we are.

This Is Not A Book About Benedict Cumberbatch is an introspective and poignant. It’s written with such humor, strength, and delight. Every story, every page, every word taught us to not be ashamed of our joy in life, but rather embrace it.

This Is Not A Book About Benedict Cumberbatch is truly not about the British actor, it’s a book about joy and finding it, with a little bitch of Cumberbatch and Cumberbitches tossed in.