One thing I really appreciate about Sedaris is not only does he share the often unflattering foibles of everyone around him, he never spares himself. Indeed, he often paints himself as the one with the worst intentions and habits. I laughed particularly hard at "In the Waiting Room" and "What I Learned". The final and longest essay, "The Smoking Section," goes through his first few months after quitting smoking. It's made more interesting by the stay in Japan during this time. These essays are sometimes poignant, often funny, and always unexpected. All in all, this is one of Sedaris's better collections. It doesn't beat out Me Talk Pretty One Day as my favorite, but it's probably in second place. ( )

Sedaris is a great humorist; our gay Mark Twain. ( )

David Sedaris' latest collection contains 21 essays and a final, longer essay, almost a novella of its own. In this audiobook read by the author, some of the essays included are live readings. His deadpan delivery enhanced the humor in his stories, so I enjoyed this more than the first book that I read, Dress Your Family in Corduroy in Denim. On the other hand, having the live readings made me feel a little strange when I wasn't laughing along with the audience. He was funny, sure, but every line wasn't as funny as they seemed to think.

While I enjoyed it overall, I don't really feel the need to seek out more of his books. I've been wondering to myself why I don't like his stories more. He writes about his life and family in such a way that comes across as self-deprecating and funny rather than narcissistic or whiny. What it comes down to, I think, is just too much information. I just don't need to know everything he shares, like about a worm coming out of Hugh's leg when he was a kid. So while I could see myself recommending his works to the right reader, I'm not planning on reading any more myself. ( )

This is my fourth Sedaris audiobook. I liked this 2009 Audie Award winner (for narration by an author) better than Holiday on Ice, but not as much as Me Talk Pretty One Day or Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim.

I thought the cover art was some modern graphic design, but it’s actually Van Gogh’s Skull of a Skeleton with Burning Cigarette. It’s reflective of some of the themes (smoking, death) and stories in this book, particularly “Momento Mori,” a live performance about Sedaris’ attempt to buy a skeleton in France as a gift for his partner Hugh. The last two discs (out of eight) are all one long essay, "The Smoking Section," about Sedaris quitting smoking at the same time he and Hugh make a three-month trip to Japan. The stories in this essay about Sedaris taking Japanese language classes felt repetitive of similar stories about taking French in France in Me Talk Pretty One Day. The title of the book comes from this essay - about instructions in a Japanese hotel room telling guest what to do in emergencies - one of the sections being titled "When You Are Engulfed in Flames."

The travel theme also runs throughout the audiobook, with one of the funniest stories being another live recording, “Solutions to Saturday’s Puzzle.” This is about Sedaris accidentally sneezing a throat lozenge into the lap of a plane seatmate whose husband he refused to exchange seats with, because he didn't want to sit in the bulkhead. He begins filling in his crossword puzzle with words of unspoken response to this crabby woman, whether they fit the clues or not.

His mother's death from lung cancer after years of smoking is also an undercurrent, but there is less of Sedaris’ family of origin in this book as compared to the other ones. Sedaris is apparently about my age, as he says he'll be 68 in 2025 as I will, and his themes seem to be getting more mature. However, this audiobook is definitely not for prudes – there is sex and lots of foul language. Good sound effects (especially for smoking - matches striking, paper burning, etc.) and acoustic bass interludes performed by Tommy Harron intersperse the essays."In the Waiting Room" and "Town and Country" are also performed live, which is David Sedaris at his best. ( )

Sedaris' elegantly constructed, darkly wry and humorous essays are a hoot and a half. The longest and best of them is the last one, an account of his attempts to quit smoking, for some reason deciding it would be easier to do this in Japan, thus embarking there with his boyfriend Hugh. Actually, as it reads, I think it probably was easier to quit there. The funniest, and even so with a poignant ending, is "Crybaby". But the whole book is loaded with gems. ( )

http://jenknox.blogspot.com/2009/04/p... ( )

David Sedaris is not a great man. A petty, sometimes shallow, pathetic man. An out-and-out asshole, even. But without a doubt, my favorite asshole in the world.

This is just the type of cheeseball thing that Mr. Sedaris would dump on in one of his essays, but here it is – I love him because I feel very much akin to the man. I don’t, regrettably, share his enormous wit, but I do share almost every one of his snarky prejudices and his self-serving musings (a declaration that adds nothing to my credit, I know). The way he pretends to be knowledgeable about art as a teenager and is distressed when his parents become enthusiasts themselves…I get that. The way he purposefully self-eulogizes while imagining himself dead…I get that.

Probably not a good thing, to align myself with the most egotistic qualities of another, but then, we’ve all been there. If we’re honest with ourselves, I think we’d find that what’s so appealing about Sedaris’s writing is that he presents himself the way he actually thinks, the way he actually interacts with others. And ugly as it usually is, it’s the way we all think and act.

I know it came out a year ago, but I finally got around to reading Sedaris’s latest book, When You are Engulfed in Flames. I think my boyfriend wanted to chuck it right through the window after I shrieked for the 17th time: “God, David Sedaris just gets it!!! He gets everything!” He does, though. He really gets why certain things are funny, even when most of the world so easily forgets why. He makes me absolutely giddy.

This is on a wholly personal note, but I also enjoy reading about his relationship with Hugh. Strange that a male homosexual relationship should remind me of my own mate, but it does. It’s not fair to say, maybe, but there’s this cutesy grownup/child dynamic going on there with David, of course, as the huffy, sensitive adolescent-type and Hugh as the responsible mature adult who pays the utility bills on time. The way Sedaris becomes exasperated whenever sensible Hugh “rains on his parade” – it smacks of a scene in which my mate is hovered over the TV tray, his brow furrowed in deep concentration while I attempt luring him into a cuddling position.

“But why do we have to do our taxes now?”

“Because, Liz, if I don’t do your taxes now, you’ll never do them yourself.”

“So?”

The last quarter of the book, entitled The Smoking Section, follows Sedaris through his first bummed cigarette 3 decades ago all the way to his recent struggle with quitting the habit. When I saw that this struggle would take Sedaris to Japan, I smiled, knowing what good material this kooky (sorry, had to say it) country would supply for the humorist. And supply it did. ( )

The best Sedaris so far? Maybe. ( )

"When You Are Engulfed in Flames" caused me to laugh out loud several times, but the stories are all about the mundane, such as his childhood babysitter who was a hick, having a pet spider, quitting smoking, learning Japanese, and living in apartments in New York, France, and Tokyo. The pieces are all disconnected from one another.

And it was more vulgar than I expected - truck drivers and BJ's; working around corpses; doing pot; being gay. Don't pick this up if you are a prude. ( )

When You are Engulfed in Flames is a collection of stories about David Sedaris’s life. Each story is humorous and has a general dark theme. After reading Me Talk Pretty One Day Senaris’s new novel caught my eye. With the title When You are Engulfed in Flames each story has a funny, awkward, and sad theme such as the chapter when Sedaris talks about his mean babysitter that he described as white and trashy.
The differences between this novel and Sedaris’s Me Talk Pretty One Day are that his earlier novels consisted of brighter stories that were also funny, but this has darker theme. One aspect of Sedaris that we learn more about is actually his sexuality. The writing portrays his homosexual tendencies which he talks more about than in previous novels. Sedaris also includes his success from earlier novels and about his current living situation in France.
There are very few recurring characters in the story which include Sedaris and his partner Hugh. Hugh is a main character because many of the essays include Hugh whether they are about Hugh’s family or looking for anniversary gifts for him. I really enjoyed this novel because there were multiple times where it made me laugh. The first couple pages is a story about a time when Sedaris went to a movie theater and commented on a woman sitting next to him, he was bothered by the fact that she put her sweater over the back of her seat, he found it strange and odd and went on about his feelings on this matter.
In conclusion I enjoyed reading David Sedaris’s novel When You are Engulfed in Flames because of the many funny and interesting essays. This novel is very different from any typical book and David Sedaris is very different from any typical author which makes this book fun to read.

It has some really funny moments, but it's best purchased from Half-Price books. That way, you won't feel slightly cheated. ( )

One of my first reads of the summer was David Sedaris’s When You Are Engulfed in Flames. It was my second time reading a Sedaris book, the first being Me Talk Pretty One Day. His latest novel provides a few laughs and chuckles, but it failed to match the hilarity found in MTPOD. If you are a fan of Sedaris’s work, then this is a must read. If you are thinking about perusing his work for the first time, it might be a better idea to try one of his earlier works. I’d give it 3/5 stars and 3.5 if you are/were a smoker. ( )

This is the best Sedaris collection to date in my opinion. Ge's a brilliant essayist and his accounts never fail to amuse me.

That said, no one's perfect, and there were a few sub-par stories in here. ( )

This is the second David Sedaris novel that I've read, the other being Me Talk Pretty One Day, and I have to say this one wasn't nearly as funny as that one. This is mildly amusing but I wouldn't go out of my way to recommend it to anyone. Mostly I was left with the impression that David Sedaris and I probably would never hit it off. ( )

I liked this book, but I think I enjoyed Me Talk Pretty One Day read a few years back) more. I seem to recall laughing more when reading “Me Talk Pretty One Day”. Sedaris’ type of humor and frankness is not for everyone, and I think he is well-known enough for most people to determine whether they’d enjoy reading him.

His observations are still sharp in “When You Are Engulfed in Flames”, but he seems more introspective, especially in the last essay (longer than the rest) about how he became a smoker and how he finally quit.

Here is a passage from “When You Are Engulfed in Flames” (he is a Princeton grad):

“Look at yourelf on the day that you graduated from college, then look at yourself today. I did that recently, and it was like ‘Yikes! What the hell happened?’

The answer, of course, is life….what we in our certainty, could not have fathomed– is that stuff comes up. Weird doors open. People fall into things. Maybe the engineering whiz will wind up brewing cider, not because he has to, but because he finds it challenging. Who knows? Maybe the athlete will bring peace to all nations, or the class moron will go on to become the president of the United States– though that’s more likely to happen at Harvard or Yale, schools that will pretty much let in anybody”. ( )

I love his sardonic humor. Sedaris has a knack for making the mundane daily grind hilarious. ( )

"When you are engulfed in Flames" by David Sedaris is a book of observations of his family and friends that can be laugh out loud funny and wonderfully snarky, but when you think about what's being said about these people and their individual idiosyncratic foibles the book is kind of sad and depressing. For this reader there is a fine line between need-to-know and too-much-information. I think Mr. Sedaris steps over it in this book more than once. One wishes that the author would spend more time observing rather than narrating. I get there has to be some personal in a personal essay, but I really wanted less of the personal this time around. ( )

What fun! Irreverent humor from America's quirkiest writer. ( )

(#40 in the 2008 Book Challenge)

I love truth in advertising; it's a David Sedaris book so I hoped it would be funny and it was funny. Great for my personal enjoyment, not so strong as a foundation for a book review, though.

Grade: A
Recommended: It's very David Sedaris. It's noteworthy, I think, that one's instinct is to say that it's great light reading, but he's very sneaky and a lot of his writing that seems light is, in fact, rather quite substantial. This seems particularly true about this book. ( )

I find David Sedaris absolutely hilarious when he appears on This American Life, but when ever I read one of his books, it leaves me with a profound sense of malaise. His written word just doesn’t work for me. It was with this knowledge that I tried the audiobooks of “When You Are Engulfed in Flames,” in hopes that I just needed Sedaris’ delivery to enjoy his book.

Happily, this was indeed the case. I found “When You Are Engulfed in Flames” to be a very enjoyable collection of essays. I’d say that the title essay, which was the last one and by far the longest, was probably my least favorite. Sedaris does have a tendency to ramble, which is usually mitigated by the short nature of his essays, but it became overly apparent in the long essay. I would forget for long periods that his whole Japan adventure began with his attempt to quit smoking.

A bit slow at the end, but overall the David Sedaris audiobook was a very enjoyable experience. ( )

This is the first book I've read by this author, so I wasn't sure what to expect. What I got was a series of humorous essays about the author's idiosyncratic view of life. The best essay by far is the last, where he quits smoking by going to Japan. I had to read sections outloud to my husband as he kept asking what I was laughing so hard about! ( )

Though not as good as the other Sedaris material I've read, this book is still hilarious. His self-loathing makes you feel better about yourself, even if just for a moment. My personal favorite essay was In the Waiting Room. ( )

More, sometimes outrageously funny essays from Sedaris, capped off by an extraordinary multi-part opus on quitting smoking. ( )

Extremely entertaining--the parts in New York took me back to the City vividly. ( )

Hilarious book. Essays on David Sedaris' life, but very well tied together - which is what makes them essays instead of stories. Both entertaining and thoughtful. ( )