Rating:  Summary: Wit? I don't think so Review: I read this book based on numerous suggestions by friends. Bear in mind that I believe these people are very intelligent and I almost universally find humor in the same things they do. Given all that, I don't know why they liked this book so much. Perhaps I had an experience with overinflated expectations. David Sedaris is often called a "witty" writer. In my dictionary, wit is defined as "the ability to perceive and express in an ingeniously humorous manner the relationship between seemingly incongruous or disparate things." If this is what happens in Me Talk Pretty One Day, I completely missed it.To me Sedaris was smug and his self-deprecation seemed completely insincere. Even when talking about how he is bad with scientific things, you get the feeling that he thinks it is better to be scientifically ignorant. My experience with reading Sedaris's tales was one of excrutiating tedium. He is very popular and liked by many of my friends so there must be something here that appeals to people. It simply doesn't appeal to me.
Rating:  Summary: Bottleneck Review: I honestly thought this was the funniest book that I have ever read.
Rating:  Summary: I made a fool of myself Review: Okay, so I am on a fairly-long airplane ride, reading the 2nd half of this book. I was laughing out-loud, to the point that when we landed, two women in the next two rows turned around and said, "I'm sorry, but I just HAVE to know what you were reading...." The funny thing was, I didn't even realize I was laughing. This book, and others by David Sedaris, are wonderful and hilarious and SO readable, all at once. I strongly recommend anything that Sedaris has written, particularly this one, to anyone who needs to have one of those "few and far between" side-splitting laughs.
Rating:  Summary: Will Success Spoil David Sedaris? Review: David Sedaris's first books, BARREL FEVER and NAKED, brought him from cult status to national celebrity status because of his singularly hilarious vision of the world. But much of his humor in those books depended on his scruffy, outsider economic status (he made his money before he became famous cleaniong other people's houses in Manhattan) and his extremely bizarre and loveable large family from North Carolina. It was easy to love Sedaris's self-deprecating hero because he was such an underdog; you couldn't help wanting him to win. But since he's become a success his subject matter has changed while his tone has not. It's very hard to feel sorry and luagh at Sedaris's circumstances when his problems include assimilating properly into French culture (his boyfriend owns a farmhouse in Normandy) or choosing among overfancy dishes at expensive Manhattan restaurants. The best bits in this collection--the first story about his lisp correction therapy, his account of his father's peculiar eating habots, and his classic "Big Boy"--retain Sedaris' sense of himself as underdog, and thus are hilarious; the rest of the collection is quite disappointing for those who loved Sedaris's first two books.
Rating:  Summary: Not impressed Review: I did not laugh. The guy is not interesting. The writing is amateurish dime store bookish. The humor is high school level. I really liked the title. Thats all.
Rating:  Summary: sedaris has a gift of sharing his life with humor Review: Me talk pretty one day is one of those books everyone should have on their shelf. Sedaris tells the stories of a family of individuals who find ways to love each other despite their glaring differences. This is one of those rare books that makes you laugh each time you lose yourself among the pages. With each story told you find yourself reliving similar moments of your past and laughing. Me talk pretty is a book that you can open any time you feel down, read a few pages or plow through the whole book again, transforming the negative emotions into a happiness that seeps from your pours and coats your skin. This is a book you fall in love with from the first page and when you get to the end you find yourself turning back the pages and enjoying some of the stories again and again. The struggles of life that rub you like sandpaper, become less painful when you are wrapped in the tals of David Sadaris. If you are looking for free flowing humor Me Talk Pretty One Day is a book you should not only have your collection but keep close.
Rating:  Summary: Great Distraction ! Review: This book is a collection of essays regarding the life of David Sedaris. Some are hilarious, others are more mundane, and some just leave you wondering why they're included in the book. All of them, however, contain a slightly slanted viewpoint about everyday occurences in the life of the author. I enjoyed most of the essays, but some include some rather crude language. This book was great for my busy schedule. I could pick it up and read an essay or two, put it down for a few days, and then pick it up again without losing any continuity. Great reading for relaxation and enjoyment.
Rating:  Summary: just hilarious Review: About a year ago, my brother, while visting, accidently left his copy of Naked behind. I read it, and i got hooked. I waited forMe Talk Pretty One Dayto come out for so long, and i was not dissapointed. It is...hilarious. Other reviewers of this book have spoken their dissapointment because the book is not continuosly sidespliting. It doesn't need to be. Sedaris has the remarkable talent for bringing the humourous out of the ordinary. He writes casualy, as if his readers already know him. His caustic and biting writing style and pleasing and more often than not, just funny. He pokes at everyone, his family and himself. His stories are believable, but only just, which makes them all the more interesting. He writes like a normal, everyday person, expressing normal everday occurences and thoughts. His work can be sad and extremley funny at the same time. He hit the nail right on the head in most of the stories, after reading the book, i realized that i agreed with him on most everything he wrote. This man is amazingly persuasive and exceptionally funny. I reccomend this book to anyone looking for a good read!
Rating:  Summary: You will look like a fool laughing out loud in public. Review: This book was an absolute gem to read. I read it on a train ride to NYC several months ago and found myself laughing -- and having to stifle my laughter realizing where I was. There isn't one story in this set that won't bring a smile and faint air of recognition. Enjoy...
Rating:  Summary: Hysterical AND My First Experience with an Audiobook! Review: This is a review of the CD audio book version of ME TALK PRETTY ONE DAY. I want to say from the start that if you have the choice of reading the printed book or listening to a recording of it, I would strongly recommend the audio book version. I know hundreds of thousands of people have listened to books on tape or CD, but this was a first for me. And I can't imagine a better book to start off with. While I enjoy reading Sedaris on page, he is the perfect reader of his own stories. I wouldn't want to listen to him read Jane Austen or Tolstoy, but I also wouldn't want to hear anyone else read these stories. Sound wise, the recordings are overall good. Several of the recordings are of live performances in front of crowds, and in many ways, these are the more enjoyable. I found myself getting more involved in the stories as the crowds did. However, in reading live, Sedaris sometimes sounds a bit strained and thin in his voice. Several of the stories were recorded in studios, and while his voice is much lower and less strained, the performances don't have quite the same degree of vitality as the live performances. I also found the music that accompanied some of the studio recordings to be a bit distracting. As far as the stories themselves go, while a few of the stories come from the periods of his life that his readers have come to know from previous books, most of them come from adulthood, and even from his period of success as an author. Probably half of the stories come from the time he has spent living in France, apparently struggling against the limits of his own French (the title comes from a literal English translation of a statement he makes in a French class about his goals with that language). Whether one prefers this book to NAKED hangs upon nothing but one's own personality. I prefer NAKED, but prefer hearing Sedaris reading his work to reading it myself. I think the main thing is that the work is consistently good through all the books. So, whether you read this yourself or listen to David read it to you, I heartily recommend this book.
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