When You Are Engulfed in Flames
David Sedaris's ability to transform the mortification of
everyday life into wildly entertaining art, ("The Christian Science
Monitor") is elevated to wilder and more entertaining s than
ever in this remarkable new book.
Trying to make coffee when the water is shut off, David considers
using the water in a vase of flowers and his chain of associations
takes him from the French countryside to a hilariously
uncomfortable memory of buying drugs in a mobile home in rural
North Carolina. In essay after essay, Sedaris proceeds from bizarre
conundrums of daily life-having a lozenge fall from your mouth into
the lap of a fellow passenger on a plane or armoring the windows
with LP covers to protect the house from neurotic songbirds-to the
most deeply resonant human truths. Culminating in a brilliant
account of his venture to Tokyo in order to quit smoking, David
Sedaris's sixth essay collection is a new masterpiece of comic
writing from "a writer worth treasuring" ("Seattle Times").
