From My Bookshelf: David Sedaris

While this book is not the typical Sedaris book that I was expecting, it is still witty, poignent and laugh out loud funny.  It is a series of excerpts from his own autobiographical journals – which may or may not be edited!  Nothing is sacred – his own drug addiction, his eccentric family, his crazy jobs, his love of International House of Pancakes.

“It is hard to imagine the Sedaris we know …who can easily fill up New York’s Carnegie Hall, as a waste…using his ironing board as a dining room table.”  after being kicked out of the family home.

His observations of everyday events, his wicked commentary on people he sees on the bus or subway will keep you amused for weeks!  This is not a book you need to read through from cover to cover.  Just pick it up and read a few pages when you need a reality check.

We all know his hilarious stories – as a Christmas elf at Macy’s, holiday on ice etc, but the …”darker corner of the Sedaris psyche can still make you gasp.”  And while he exposes himself, and occasionally his siblings, it is how he sees other people that I find most fascinating.  Sedaris has been described as …”the man whose eye is unerringly drawn away from the main action to life’s compelling absurdities.”  …”Sedaris can pick out the mad person in a crowd like a sniffer dog searching or a drug mule.”

If your sense of humour runs to the absurd you will enjoy this book.  You will get his satire, the weirdness of how he sees the world.  I have been to the IHOP  and I never have any stories to tell.  His writing is brilliant and there is always a comedic surprise.  I loved this book!

……………and others

Theft by finding occurs when someone who chances upon an object which seems abandoned and takes possession of the object but fails to take steps to establish whether the object is abandoned and not merely lost or unattended.