David Sedaris
David Sedaris plays in the snow with his sisters. He goes on vacation with his family. He gets a job selling drinks. He attends his brother’s wedding. He mops his sister’s floor. He gives directions to a lost traveler. He eats a hamburger. He has his blood sugar tested. It all sounds so normal, doesn’t it? In his newest collection of essays, David Sedaris lifts the corner of ordinary life, revealing the absurdity teeming below its surface. His world is alive with obscure desires and hidden motives — a world where forgiveness is automatic and an argument can be the highest form of love. [This book] is another unforgettable collection from one of the wittiest and most original writers at work today.
This book is also another one of my "4 for $1" Dakota County Library finds. Youngest daughter, KayJay, had gifted Sedaris' Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk to me 11 years ago (read its review here) and I thought it was pretty funny, so when I saw this at such a cheap price, I snatched it up. Not as many actual laughs here, but certainly humorous essays nonetheless. This collection is far more personal than the previous book I had read, kind of like a memoir-with-poetic-license. Commenting on this book, Ann Hood, of the Providence Journal, wrote: "It's tough to write humor; it's tougher still to make humor matter." Can't really say that I think Sedaris has done it with this collection. It's okay...but does it matter? Meh.
First Line: When my family first moved to North Carolina, we lived in a rented house three blocks from the school where I would begin the third grade.
Page 56 / Line 5: Rather than sparkling, they remained flat and impassive, like old dimes.
Last Line: So pleasing to the eye.
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