They Called Us Exceptional

Gupta's raw and scintillating memoir highlights the gray areas in immigrant and first-generation lives, the romanticized ideas of success, and the misunderstandings of mental health. I was captivated from beginning to end and impressed by her willingness to be 100% vulnerable in this book - knowing her family and friends would read it. She writes truth in a brave and candid way that I only wish I could do in writing. This is a book that many of us have been waiting for - for my first gen people out there - I felt seen.

When I read this heart-wrenching, poignant memoir about the devastating costs that comes with pushing yourself to live up to others’ expectations, I felt like I was watching part of my life’s story from a bird’s-eye view.

As a daughter of immigrants, I grew up being told that success was conditional on my being exceptional, no matter the cost. But when we tell people that their mental health, community, love, relationships, and compassion come secondary to living up to others’ expectations, it isn’t success at all. A must-read for all, but especially for anyone who has had to contend with… show more.

In a weaving of revelatory family secrets and cultural insights, Prachi Gupta helps us to understand not only how our personal lives are truly political, but also how politics are used as a tool to divide us.

In this beautifully crafted part memoir, part theory, part personal chronicle, we are able to see how stereotypes in the U.S. have been created to divide and conquer entire communities of marginalized folks, leaving families in shambles along the way.

A key takeaway I gathered was the anti-Black racism embedded in the model minority myth and the ways in which racism and its… show more.