Me Talk Pretty One Day

By David Sedaris and David. Sedaris

This vibrant collection of expat essays from legendary humorist David Sedaris is a cause for jubiliation. Sedaris's move to Paris in the early aughts inspired hilarious pieces, such as "Me Talk Pretty One Day", about his attempts to learn French. His family is another inspiration--"You Cant Kill the Rooster" is a portrait of his brother who talks incessant hip-hop slang to his bewildered father. And no one hones a finer fury in response to such modern annoyances as restaurant meals presented in ludicrous towers and cashiers with 6-inch fingernails. Compared by The New Yorker to Twain and Hawthorne, Sedaris is one of America's best-loved authors, and his biting essays on living in Paris are some of the funniest he's ever written. (At last, someone even meaner than the French!) The sort of blithely sophisticated, loopy humour that might have resulted if Dorothy Parker and James Thurber had a love child. "If you're looking for some comic relief, look no further than David Sedaris." ―NPR

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Published Jun 5, 2001

Average rating: 7.19

257 RATINGS

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Community Reviews

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Shaunace
3/10 stars
Short book, good narrator. Some very funny moments. But my life didn’t change where I read it or not. It felt like nothing of substance. I didn’t get a good understanding of who this person was, just a collection of funny moments that had nothing to do with anything.
Cindy Huskey
Cindy Huskey
8/10 stars
Strange, awkward, and absolutely hilarious!
Suzanne82
Suzanne82
10/10 stars
David Sedaris has a way of choosing details that really make his stories. You can't retell the plot of any of his stories so that it's funny- it's all about the carefully selected details and description. After reading Sedaris, I find I am also noticing more of those hilarious details that are in everday life, so it's great to read because its effect carries on long after I've put the book down. You might even say it's "moving" in an unorthodox sense of the word. Like books that leave readers a bit emotional or just thoughtful, reading Sedaris always makes me funnier.

Me Talk Pretty One Day is my favorite of Sedaris so far. There are several laugh out loud funny moments in almost every story. "Big Boy" is one of my favorites.
S
Sophia Antjas Morton
6/10 stars
Not my favorite, but found most aspects quite amusing.
SusannahK
SusannahK
Hilarious. I love almost all of his books.

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