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If you've ever laughed your way through David Sedaris's cheerfully misanthropic stories, you might think you know what you're getting with Calypso. You'd be wrong. When he buys a beach house on the Carolina coast, Sedaris envisions long, relaxing vacations spent playing board games and lounging in the sun with those he loves most. And it's as idyllic as he imagined, except for one tiny, vexing realization: it's impossible to take a vacation from yourself. With Calypso, Sedaris sets his formidable powers of observation - and dark humor - toward middle age and mortality.
Looking back over his life, from schoolboy crushes (on girls and boys) to discovering the power of making people laugh (in the Cambridge Footlights with David Mitchell), and from losing his beloved mother to becoming a husband and father, Robert Webb considers the absurd expectations boys and men have thrust upon them at every stage of life.
Welcome to the hilarious, strange, elegiac, outrageous world of David Sedaris. In Naked, Sedaris turns the current mania for the memoir on its proverbial ear, mining the exceedingly rich terrain of his life, his family, and his unique worldview, a sensibility at once take-no-prisoners sharp and deeply charitable.
Once again, David Sedaris brings together a collection of essays so uproariously funny and profoundly moving that his legions of fans will fall for him all over again. He tests the limits of love when Hugh lances a boil from his backside, and pushes the boundaries of laziness when, finding the water shut off in his house in Normandy, he looks to the water in a vase of fresh cut flowers to fill the coffee machine.
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. Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim is another unforgettable collection from one of the wittiest and most original writers at work today.
From the unique perspective of David Sedaris comes a new collection of essays taking his listeners on a bizarre and stimulating world tour. From the perils of French dentistry to the eating habits of the Australian kookaburra, from the squat-style toilets of Beijing to the particular wilderness of a North Carolina Costco, we learn about the absurdity and delight of a curious traveler's experiences.
If you've ever laughed your way through David Sedaris's cheerfully misanthropic stories, you might think you know what you're getting with Calypso. You'd be wrong. When he buys a beach house on the Carolina coast, Sedaris envisions long, relaxing vacations spent playing board games and lounging in the sun with those he loves most. And it's as idyllic as he imagined, except for one tiny, vexing realization: it's impossible to take a vacation from yourself. With Calypso, Sedaris sets his formidable powers of observation - and dark humor - toward middle age and mortality.
Looking back over his life, from schoolboy crushes (on girls and boys) to discovering the power of making people laugh (in the Cambridge Footlights with David Mitchell), and from losing his beloved mother to becoming a husband and father, Robert Webb considers the absurd expectations boys and men have thrust upon them at every stage of life.
Welcome to the hilarious, strange, elegiac, outrageous world of David Sedaris. In Naked, Sedaris turns the current mania for the memoir on its proverbial ear, mining the exceedingly rich terrain of his life, his family, and his unique worldview, a sensibility at once take-no-prisoners sharp and deeply charitable.
Once again, David Sedaris brings together a collection of essays so uproariously funny and profoundly moving that his legions of fans will fall for him all over again. He tests the limits of love when Hugh lances a boil from his backside, and pushes the boundaries of laziness when, finding the water shut off in his house in Normandy, he looks to the water in a vase of fresh cut flowers to fill the coffee machine.
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. Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim is another unforgettable collection from one of the wittiest and most original writers at work today.
From the unique perspective of David Sedaris comes a new collection of essays taking his listeners on a bizarre and stimulating world tour. From the perils of French dentistry to the eating habits of the Australian kookaburra, from the squat-style toilets of Beijing to the particular wilderness of a North Carolina Costco, we learn about the absurdity and delight of a curious traveler's experiences.
David Sedaris' collection of essays - including live recordings! - tells a most unconventional life story. With every clever turn of a phrase, Sedaris brings a view and a voice like no other to every unforgettable encounter. You can also listen to Sedaris in an interview with Terry Gross on Fresh Air.
David Sedaris's beloved holiday collection is new again with six more pieces, including a never before published story. Along with such favorites as the diaries of a Macy's elf and the annals of two very competitive families, are Sedaris's tales of tardy trick-or-treaters ("Us and Them"); the difficulties of explaining the Easter Bunny to the French ("Jesus Shaves"); and what to do when you've been locked out in a snowstorm ("Let It Snow").
Father Greg Lockwood is unlike any Catholic priest you have ever met - a man who lounges in boxer shorts, who loves action movies, and whose constant jamming on the guitar reverberates "like a whole band dying in a plane crash in 1972". His daughter is an irreverent poet who long ago left the church's country. When an unexpected crisis leads her and her husband to move back into her parents' rectory, their two worlds collide.
In Alan Partridge: Nomad, Alan dons his boots, windcheater and scarf and embarks on an odyssey through a place he once knew - it's called Britain - intent on completing a journey of immense personal significance. Diarising his ramble in the form of a 'journey journal', Alan details the people and places he encounters, ruminates on matters large and small and, on a final leg fraught with danger, becomes not a man (because he was one to start off with) but a better, more inspiring example of a man.
Al Franken, Giant of the Senate is a book about an unlikely campaign that had an even more improbable ending: the closest outcome in history and an unprecedented eight-month recount saga, which is pretty funny in retrospect. It's a book about what happens when the nation's foremost progressive satirist gets a chance to serve in the United States Senate and, defying the low expectations of the pundit class, actually turns out to be good at it.
The long-awaited first novel from the author of Tenth of December: a moving and original father-son story featuring none other than Abraham Lincoln, as well as an unforgettable cast of supporting characters, living and dead, historical and invented. February 1862. The Civil War is less than one year old. The fighting has begun in earnest, and the nation has begun to realize it is in for a long, bloody struggle. Meanwhile, President Lincoln's beloved eleven-year-old son, Willie, lies upstairs in the White House, gravely ill.
Likened to the works of Faulkner and Dickens when it was first published 20 years ago, this extraordinarily accomplished debut novel is a brilliantly plotted story of forbidden love and piercing political drama, centered on the tragic decline of an Indian family in the state of Kerala, on the southernmost tip of India. Armed only with the invincible innocence of children, the twins Rahel and Esthappen fashion a childhood for themselves in the shade of the wreck that is their family.
LIVE recordings of new, previously unreleased David Sedaris stories!
With extraordinary access to the West Wing, Michael Wolff reveals what happened behind-the-scenes in the first nine months of the most controversial presidency of our time in Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House. Since Donald Trump was sworn in as the 45th President of the United States, the country—and the world—has witnessed a stormy, outrageous, and absolutely mesmerizing presidential term that reflects the volatility and fierceness of the man elected Commander-in-Chief.
In the late 1980s Jon Ronson was the keyboard player in the Frank Sidebottom Oh Blimey Big Band. Frank wore a big fake head. Nobody outside his inner circle knew his true identity. This became the subject of feverish speculation during his zenith years. Together, they rode relatively high. Then it all went wrong. Twenty-five years later and Jon has co-written a movie, Frank, inspired by his time in this great and bizarre band. Frank is set for release in 2014, starring Michael Fassbender, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Domhnall Gleeson and directed by Lenny Abrahamson.
Them began as a book about different kinds of extremists, but after Jon had got to know some of them - Islamic fundamentalists, neo-Nazis, Ku Klux Klansmen - he found that they had one oddly similar belief: that a tiny, shadowy elite rule the world from a secret room. In Them, Jon sets out, with the help of the extremists, to locate that room. The journey is as creepy as it is comic, and along the way Jon is chased by men in dark glasses, unmasked as a Jew in the middle of a Jihad training camp, and more.
More than any other presidency, Barack Obama's eight years in the White House were defined by young people - 20-somethings who didn't have much experience in politics (or anything else, for that matter) yet suddenly found themselves in the most high-stakes office building on earth. David Litt was one of those 20-somethings. After graduating from college in 2008, he went straight to the Obama campaign. In 2011 he became one of the youngest White House speechwriters in history.
'He's like an American Alan Bennett, in that his own fastidiousness becomes the joke, as per the taxi encounter, or his diary entry about waiting interminably in a coffee-bar queue.' (Brian Logan, Guardian review of An Evening with David Sedaris)
The point is to find out who you are and to be true to that person. Because so often you can't. Won't people turn away if they know the real me? you wonder. The me that hates my own child, that put my perfectly healthy dog to sleep? The me who thinks, deep down, that maybe The Wire was overrated?
For nearly four decades, David Sedaris has faithfully kept a diary in which he records his thoughts and observations on the odd and funny events he witnesses. Anyone who has attended a live Sedaris event knows that his diary readings are often among the most joyful parts of the evening. But never before have they been available in print or audio.
Now, in Theft by Finding, Sedaris brings us his favourite entries. From the family home in Raleigh, North Carolina, we follow Sedaris as he sets out to make his way in the world. As an art student and then a teacher in Chicago, he works at a succession of very odd jobs, meeting even odder people, before moving to New York to pursue a career as a writer - where instead he very quickly lands a job in Macy's department store as an elf in Santaland....
Tender, hilarious, illuminating, and endlessly captivating, Theft by Finding offers a rare look into the mind of one of our generation's greatest comic geniuses.
I am a great fan of David Sedaris’ work, both the written and the performances, in which he shows an uncanny eye for finding the ridiculous and absurd in everyday people and events. Listen to any of his books, and you will find yourself smiling, a lot.
Not so with this title in which, through his personal diaries, Sedaris draws a picture of an America far darker and more dangerous than Hollywood ever let on, populated by bigoted and ignorant people who’s only thought is ‘What’s in this for me?’
David is in his 20s, and has relocated from the family home in North Carolina to the big, bad city of Chicago. Financial pressures mean he has to consider every penny when scouting for a rental apartment, and thus he ends up living in a very run-down and dirty part of town. He learns early on that if you want the cops to come to your aid you need to use the word ‘Gun’ when you call them, otherwise they just ain’t coming.
A typical day for Sedaris starts with the physical and verbal abuse he experiences from passing cars or strangers on the street pretty much every time he steps outside, followed by witnessing repeated abuse toward waiters in his favourite diner, then having his possessions snatched from him by vagrants as he walks along. This is then compounded by the dark, awful stories of abuse, addiction and squalor he hears from random people he encounters. A nation of helpless, hopeless people who have given up, and now spend their days with only one aim, to get as high as possible at someone else’s expense. People with nothing, who have nothing to lose…
The writing, and Sedaris’ delivery, is as brilliant as ever, even though I do find I take a deep breath every time I take off my headphones, just to clean the dirt out of my system.
A very different listening experience…
2 of 2 people found this review helpful
There's ten years of diaries here and they become boring fairly quickly. It's a long audio book and there's none of the lightness of story of his other work. In fact as they're diaries, there's no story at all.
this is very much simply the inside of his head without much humour. As he's depressed, broke and a heavy drug user for all the parts I listened to, it's also fairly depressing
There is an interest in seeing what interests him - what he remembers and comments on. You can see how those themes come out in his more structured work.
But as his other books areso autobiographical anyway, i found this repetitive and dull. I tried really hard but i could only get through a few hours before wanting to throw it out the window. if you're looking for story any of his other works are superb.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful
I'm a massive fan of David Sedaris and I listen to his other books again and again. However this one is just an endless list of observations and events in chronological order. None of the great storytelling that he is known for.
Also, because it is chronological, it lingers forever in his early years of addiction, poverty and hopelessness. I don't know if I'll make it past chapter one!
6 of 8 people found this review helpful
Loved it - funny, weird and pensive all at once. David Sedaris is one of my all time favorite storytellers
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
No real storyline, but small snaps from diaries
so you need to know all his previous books. Not funny but maybe interessant for some people.
4 of 7 people found this review helpful
Having loved listening to David on the BBC ‘Meet’ programmes it was great to get background / history on the author and his family and friends. It left me with the warm feeling that most people are weird as shit.
The diary format of this book takes some getting used to, but it is worth a listen. If your a fan of Sedaris then his diary excerpts will fill out and contextualise some of excellent stories. The snapshots from the decades of this excellent authors life also provide us with an insight into David Sedaris himself and chart his slog through years of finding his feet and eventual success and fame. I love a self confessed failure finding his place in the world. His is a success story that so many can relate to and many will just find funny and interesting. Not my favourite but definitely a grower and one to return to again
I really wanted to like this because the title is great! unfortunately, it's shockingly boring and monotoned.
I love David Sedaris so I enjoyed this book immensely. Very funny and excellent narration as usual by David. Would highly recommend
an insightful delve into the past of a well loved writer and broadcaster. highly recommended
david sedaris remembers with some trepidation his early years as a diarist. it makes his transformation into the brilliant literate and humorous writer of today all the more amazing
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
If you love David Sedaris you'll love this book, if you've never encountered him, this is a great entree to his work. The diaries give you a great insight into David and his hilarious way of encountering the world. I absolutely adored this book!
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
An eclectic mix of an eccentric view of day to day life. Challenges contemporary values and behaviours. Entertaining & often amusing Sedaris captures the madness, mayhem and double standards of humanity.
These snippets of Sedaris are variously hilarious, heart wrenching, tender, silly, frustrating and always, ALWAYS the bare bones truth of it. Every day is better with this level of honesty. David Sedaris is a treasure: a man unafraid of himself or the truth as he sees it. I could take a bath in his writings were it possible.