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Summary
Summary
Featuring David Sedaris's unique blend of hilarity and heart, this new collection of keen-eyed animal-themed tales is an utter delight. Though the characters may not be human, the situations in these stories bear an uncanny resemblance to the insanity of everyday life.
In "The Toad, the Turtle, and the Duck," three strangers commiserate about animal bureaucracy while waiting in a complaint line. In "Hello Kitty," a cynical feline struggles to sit through his prison-mandated AA meetings. In "The Squirrel and the Chipmunk," a pair of star-crossed lovers is separated by prejudiced family members.
With original illustrations by Ian Falconer, author of the bestselling Olivia series of children's books, these stories are David Sedaris at his most observant, poignant, and surprising.
Author Notes
David Sedaris was born in Binghamton, New York on December 26, 1956, but he grew up in Raleigh, North Carolina. Much of Sedaris' humor is autobiographical and self-deprecating, and it often concerns his family life, his middle class upbringing in the suburbs of North Carolina. He graduated from the Art Institute of Chicago in 1987. He is a popular radio commentator, essayist, and short story writer. He held many part-time and odd jobs before getting a job reading excerpts from his diaries on National Public Radio in 1992.
His first collection of essays and short stories, Barrel Fever, was published in 1994. His other works include Naked, Holidays on Ice, Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim, When You Are Engulfed in Flames, Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk: A Modest Bestiary, Theft by Finding: Diaries (1977-2002), and Calypso. Me Talk Pretty One Day won the Thurber Prize for American Humor in 2001. He has also written several plays with his sister Amy Sedaris including Stump the Host, Stitches, and The Little Frieda Mysteries. In 2014 her title, Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls, made The New York Times Best Seller List.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Like a modern-day Aesop or La Fontaine, Sedaris has his darkly comic and deeply cynical (if somewhat rambling) morality stories enacted by animals. Although Sedaris typically narrates his works solo, here he is joined by Dylan Baker, Si,n Phillips, and (the incomparable) Elaine Stritch. The dry tones of both women are particularly well suited to the knowing commentary offered by various domesticated, barnyard, and wild animals on casual racism, self-congratulatory sanctimony, poor excuses for adultery, and fad spiritualism, among other common societal ills. The audiobook features a bonus fable not available in the text version of the book; in addition, the third CD includes PDFs of the book's illustrations by Ian Falconer (writer/illustrator of the Olivia picture book series). A Little, Brown hardcover. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Guardian Review
These are not the usual comic essays about his personal life we have become accustomed to in Naked and Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim. Twenty-first-century Aesop's Fables would be one way of describing the stories, called "The Cat and the Baboon", "The Crow and the Lamb", "The Parrot and the Pot-bellied Pig" etc, except that they're funnier and much, much darker. Here's how one begins: "It was the stupidest thing the cat had ever heard of, an AA programme in prison - like you could find anything decent in here anyway. But if it would get his sentence reduced well, alright, he'd sign up, dance the 12 steps, do whatever it took to cut out early. Once he was free he'd break into the nearest liquor store . . . but between now and then he'd sit with the sad sacks and get by with a little aftershave." I stopped reading Sedaris when I thought he was straying into Garrison Keeler whimsy, but this is different - sharp, satirical, modern. The mouse who adopts a baby snake finds it almost spooky how like-minded they are. "On the weather, on the all important hoard-or-binge question, the two were most definitely on the same page." Until the snake grows and gets hungry. Elaine Stritch as the crow teaching meditation to the sheep is pure magic. - Sue Arnold These are not the usual comic essays about his personal life we have become accustomed to in Naked and Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim. Twenty-first-century Aesop's Fables would be one way of describing the stories, called "The Cat and the Baboon", "The Crow and the Lamb", "The Parrot and the Pot-bellied Pig" etc, except that they're funnier and much, much darker. - Sue Arnold.
Booklist Review
The ancient Greeks had Aesop, seventeenth-century French people read the fables of La Fontaine, and now we, jaded inhabitants of the modern era, possess the distinct privilege to enjoy the beloved Sedaris' first collection of short animal tales. The appeal of this aesthetically pleasing little volume is inherent, as the American ambassador of the comedy memoir, human division, turns now to creatures of the hoofed and winged variety to make us laugh and, perhaps, learn a lesson. Illustrations by Falconer (of the Olivia children's books) are a perfect pairing for Sedaris' stories (both writer and illustrator have been published extensively in the New Yorker). In Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk, foibled fabular heroines are given the opportunity to, finally, display all those humanlike thoughts and behaviors they've been banned from for ages. There's the motherless bear who alienates herself with her incessant, self-centered solicitations of pity, and the potbellied pig who, no matter the diet, just can't lose his breed-inherited descriptor. It's impossible to imagine the brainstorm that conjured up these absurd, animated tales, but readers will certainly be grateful that they rained from Sedaris' pen. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Sedaris' name creates its own buzz and will continue to do so even with this quirky little book.--Bostrom, Annie Copyright 2010 Booklist
