Rating: 
Summary: Pure Entertainment
Review: This book made me laugh out loud in public places when I was commuting to work. Sedaris has a way of writing that makes you feel as if you were going through the experience with him. I have never laughed so hard when reading a book as I did with this one!
Rating: 
Summary: Stark Naked
Review: Ever heard the cliché stark naked? This phrase does a good job of summing up this book. David Sedaris' Naked exhibits Sedaris' renowned stark humor. This humorous writing style plays a large role in Sedaris' recognition as an author. He has every right to complain in this book, but he doesn't. He takes all of his emotions and ideas and wraps them up into what are possibly the most hilariously written stories of childhood, adolescence, growing up, life, culture, et cetera. Thus Naked is very entertaining, not depressing, and it still gets its points across well.
Other than briefly hearing him on NPR, Naked was my introduction to Dave Sedaris. I have had many people recommend the book, but could not find the time to read it. I was pretty intimidated by the Sedaris cult following. When I finally got around to it and the book was over in no time. People who I talked to about this book referring to it as a book suited for teenage reading or some type of 'coming of age' novel. I am a teenager, so I kept this preconceived idea in my head while I read. I found that this classification was quite valid. Who else can appreciate his writing more than people who are right in the middle of many of his well-illustrated situations than those who are living much of it?
I think Naked is one of the most American books I've seen in a long time, not that Sedaris writes like a classic American or something of that nature, but what he depicts is profoundly American. Naked brings all of the things society doesn't want to talk about (i.e. nudity, parenthood, obsessive compulsive disorder, premenstrual syndrome, etc.) to the surface in this book. Even when I wasn't laughing out loud at the book at times when I suspect others would, I found the content and writing style was lovely even when I didn't find it comical. I, like many, would recommend this book because I think it lives up to its burlesque title. -(Alvin, Grade 12, Contemporary Fiction/ Creative Writing)
Rating:
Summary: Bravo o kyrios!
Review: David's Greek. I'm Greek. And we both grew up in strange worlds as Naked's opening essays prove.Still, you don't have to be part of the Greek club. What's not funny about an old grandmother picking through the neighbors bird-feeder? How can we not be sympathetic and sickened by Sedaris' childhood ticks and compulsions? I won't give away any more, except that this is better than "Me Talk Pretty One Day."
Rating:
Summary: nakedness
Review: In one word.....WoW..a gorgeous writer, I was first Introduced to ME TALK PRETTY ONE DAY ....I couldn't read it in public because I was too embarrased to fall to the ground....crying of too much laughter...He writes the littlest things that society thinks but does not say out loud. Truly the best wittest writer. I could understand completely through his emotions..I said" Wait a minute is this my life?...Hold on is this my family? I would love to met you Mr. Sedaris as well as seeing your plays. The level of humor is what I've been waiting for a long time..NO MORE Dramitica(meaning dramatic) stories in my life. It's all about Naked...oh and he talks real pretty!=)
Rating:
Summary: Very humorous essays
Review: Along with _Me_Talk_Pretty_One_Day_, this is the best of Sedaris's work. All the stories were great, and only one is repeated in another book (Dinah the Christmas [] also appears in Holidays on Ice).
The title of the book comes from the final story, about a week spent at a nudist colony.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant and Hilarious!!!
Review: I have read this book several times and it never fails to make me laugh out loud. You must buy this book if you are a fan of laughing!! You'll laugh all the way to the bank!! Its True!!!
Rating:
Summary: Can I Give It More Stars?! Please?!?!?!
Review: If I could, I would give this book ten or twenty stars. In fact I would give it every star in the sky. I won't waste your time by writing a long review, because you should be reading this book instead! You will laugh until you pee your pants or die, whichever comes first. Great fun, even if the pee is a mess.
Rating:
Summary: Sedaris -- Rights of Passage
Review: I first heard David Sedaris on WBEZ's "This American Life." He read an exerpt from his book Naked and I was curious to read more of his novel. Naked is one of the funniest books I've ever read! The essays in the book deal with Sedaris's passage into adulthood. Although, the book loses it's luster in the middle, it does pick up some-what in the end.
Rating:
Summary: Rights of Passage
Review: I first heard Sedaris on WBEZ's "This American Life" hosted by Ira Glass. This is the first book I've read by Sedaris. I was impressed by his candid humor and unapologetic storytelling. The essays all relate to rights of passage The book starts of really well, but loses it's luster in the middle, but picks up somewhat in the end. It just seems that Sedaris at 8 is much more likeable, than Sedaris at 25.
Rating: 
Summary: Looking for humor, finding little
Review: Wanting and expecting to enjoy "Naked" may have been an explanation as to why I did not enjoy this book. My naiveté. "Naked" reads like P.J. O'Rourke's adaptation of Brett Easton Ellis' "American Psycho". While O'Rourke is intelligent and insightful with his biting sarcasm and wit, Sedaris was simply dark and at times, cruel and mean, without the insight. His first chapter, "Chipped beef," showed some promise. But by the second, "A plague of tics," about a young boy with obsessive-compulsive disorder of a serious magnitude, I was nervously squirming, hoping that these were but rough spots. But then he moved to dumping on his grandmother, Ya-Ya ("Get your Ya-Ya's out"), and it became much more difficult to continue. Poor grandmothers. As if age alone was not cruel. Why have an ungrateful grandson to add to the trouble? His fourth chapter, "Next of kin" did not revive my hopes for some humor. Perhaps it was funny but it was more perverted than humorous. His next chapter, "Cyclops," opens with, "When he was young my father shot out his best friend's eye with a BB gun." Pretty grim. Within a page, it becomes internecine, as "my sister Tiffany stabbed me in the eye with a freshly sharpened pencil." Then the father gives the story an even more perverted twist. The next chapter, "The Women's Open" was an improvement. For better, funny dark humor, I recommend Martin Amis, Joseph Heller or the aforementioned O'Rourke.
|
