Astrid Hawk

This is a review of the audio book - normally I don't call that out, but in this case there are differences between the audio and print versions that can impact the experience beyond just narration:

1. The audio book is "read" by David Sedaris (see #2 for why "read" gets quotation marks). If, like me, you have fond childhood memories of hearing some of his snippets on NPR, then you'll understand why there was no way I was going to read his book with my eyeballs. My imagination just wasn't going to quite get his inflection and cheerfully dark tone right.
2. Several (4? I think?) of the... essays? bits? chapters, we'll say, are actually recordings of Sedaris's live performances. I suspect that these will differ slightly from the versions in print in terms of exact wording used, but additionally, with the live recording of course you get the audience laughter (and Sedaris's pauses for said laughter). It was a bit jarring the first time, and my initial reaction was that I felt cheated in some way - which is a bit silly, really, but it's true. There's a sense of intimacy you get from listening to a memoir narrated by the author (the live-er of the life under discussion as it were) - as if the author is telling *me* their stories. I mean, of course it's obvious that they're speaking to a whole host of unknown people, but it's 1 at a time. Telling their stories, very personally, to each listener individually. And then suddenly when you hear an audience laughing, it breaks the spell. Almost like you're just standing backstage, or out in the hall of a performance center, overhearing a production that wasn't meant for you because you didn't get tickets to that show. I know, it sounds petty, but it was a bit weird. Also, the certain knowledge that those bits were just recycled bits from shows rather than fresh stories for the book was disappointing as well. Most likely *all* of them are, but having the audience laughing really made it clear.
3. Most audio books just have a short pause in between chapters - the narrator speaks the last sentence of the previous chapter, there's a short bit of silence, usually no more than 3 seconds, and the narrator announces the title of the next chapter and continues. This book uses little bits of music in those interstitial spaces. They're all different, more rhythm than melody - sort of like the little bits one might have heard on NPR really. I think by the end I liked it - but in some places it was bizarre because they layered the music over Sedaris's voice, which makes it both harder to hear the punch line/introduction, and is sometimes jarring... the tone of the music didn't seem to have anything to do with the tone of either chapters' content.

As for the content of the book - I will assume that there aren't really any meaningful differences between the audio and print/ebook formats. Many people have said that the book was too dark and less funny than his others. I haven't read his others (though as I said, I grew up hearing various of his bits on NPR), so I can't compare across works. I suspect that what people are referring to is that this book deals with some topics that most readers will consider dark/heavy:

• Several stories deal with Sedaris's younger sister's suicide
• One story deals with his mother's alcoholism
• Several stories (and one in particular focuses on it) deal with his father's aging
• His mother's death from cancer is frequently mentioned, though none of the stories focus on this experience

I personally didn't find those sections particularly dark. Sedaris's tone is perfect - not quite blithe, but just cheerful enough to imply that he sees the darkness and is choosing to find the humor in it. It doesn't feel forced, and there's an undercurrent of the sense that these things are very affecting - but it stays funny. Personally, as someone who has an alcoholic parent and is also dealing with rapidly aging parents right now, and is also approaching (or possibly in the middle of, depending on whose definition you use) middle age, I found these bits almost comforting. People rarely talk about these things outside of whispered confidences with friends (of which I have few) or dedicated support groups (which are far too serious and depressing for my tastes) - and it's helpful, to me, to know that even people with Sedaris's kind of brain, his kind of success, deal with these same issues and can find the humor.

There's plenty of other "lighter" content in the book however - spats and conflicting quirks between Sedaris and his boyfriend (he stated that he doesn't like the term partner, so I won't tar him with that brush by using the term even though I myself prefer it); ridiculous things his siblings do in their adulthood; hilarious anecdotes ranging from his beach house life to things that happened to him on-tour to various pranks he's pulled on people (to mixed effect). Overall I enjoyed it - a fun escape from the heaviness of the world around me for my walks the last few days.