Naked Author: David Sedaris | Language: English | ISBN:
B0026IUOH8 | Format: PDF
Naked Description
In Naked, David Sedaris's message alternately rendered in Fakespeare, Italian, Spanish, and pidgin Greek is the same: pay attention to me.
Whether he's taking to the road with a thieving quadriplegic, sorting out the fancy from the extra-fancy in a bleak fruit-packing factory, or celebrating Christmas in the company of a recently paroled prostitute, this collection of memoirs creates a wickedly incisive portrait of an all-too-familiar world. It takes Sedaris from his humiliating bout with obsessive behavior in A Plague of Tics to the title story, where he is finally forced to face his naked self in the mirrored sunglasses of a lunatic. At this soulful and moving moment, he picks potato chip crumbs from his pubic hair and wonders what it all means.
This remarkable journey into his own life follows a path of self-effacement and a lifelong search for identity, leaving him both under suspicion and overdressed.
- File Size: 411 KB
- Print Length: 291 pages
- Publisher: Back Bay Books; 1st edition (May 4, 2009)
- Sold by: Hachette Book Group
- Language: English
- ASIN: B0026IUOH8
- Text-to-Speech: Not enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #15,033 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #28
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Humor & Entertainment > Humor > Essays - #56
in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Humor > Essays
- #28
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Humor & Entertainment > Humor > Essays - #56
in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Humor > Essays
This book is classified as a memoir, and it's the funniest one I've read to date. Growing up Greek in North Carolina couldn't have been easy, but adding to the mix a crazy grandmother and a sibling with a penchant for using towels as toilet paper makes it that much harder (and funnier, to us).
David was struck with enthusiastic OCD as a child, only to find ways to "cure" his tics in college. His stories of life after schooling include apple-picking and packing, working with jade (not to mention a crazy, hypocritical Christian), and refinishing woodwork with a Jew-hating Lithuanian and a somewhat confused black guy. He hitchhikes with all levels of human decapitation until a rowdy truck driver combs thicket by the roadside looking for him.
Not all of the fifteen stories are side-splitting funny. "I Like Guys" highlights accepting his homosexual feelings, and an undercurrent of seriousness lines the story. "Ashes" tells of his mother's cancer, and a sense of tragedy seems to sober his usually razor-sharp satirical style.
The last (and title) story, "Naked", tells of his experience with a nudist colony. It's written in more a journal form (the others are written in a 'flashback' form) and by the end, you feel strange in your own clothing.
I definitely plan on recommending this book to my friends. I don't see how you could live your life without picking up a Sedaris book.
By RSO Kent
NAKED is--by far--the funniest book I have ever read. Several people suggested that I read it, and I ignored them for a long time: I had a lot of other books I wanted to get to first. I finally read it this weekend. The next thing I knew, I was ordering HOLIDAYS ON ICE and BARREL FEVER.
NAKED is a collection of true stories from David Sedaris's life. I only wish my life was half as funny.
"Chipped Beef," "Get Your Ya-Ya's Out" and "I Like Guys" are highlights of this collection, but the funniest story is "A Plague of Tics." In it, Sedaris discusses his strange behaviors as a child: licking lightswitches, hitting himself with his shoe. I laughed so hard reading this story that my roommate told me I was going to have to shut up.
Give NAKED a shot. If you like it, pick up BARREL FEVER. It isn't as funny, but it's close.
By S. A. Loibner II
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