In Happy-Go-Lucky, David Sedaris brings his signature wit and dark humor to a collection of essays that reflect on life’s absurdities, from family dynamics to aging in a pandemic era. Sedaris’ sharp observational style and candid storytelling are as engaging as ever, mixing laugh-out-loud moments with deeper, more reflective passages. While some essays take a more serious tone, the book maintains a lightness that fans of his work will appreciate. It’s an enjoyable read that offers both humor and heart, making it a great choice for those who enjoy clever, self-deprecating humor and quirky insights into the human experience.

Sedaris does such an amazing job reflecting on the past, making light of it, and making us think about all of the thinks that don’t make much sense in the world and with our families.

This is good and funny!

As always, Sedaris delivers. His cutting wit and erudite observations, rather than being off-putting, are relatable and his essays will leave you rollicking with knowing laughter.

Davis Sedaris can do no wrong, and his latest book of essays is more of the same — in the best way. Even when taking on serious subjects, including death, mourning, and grief, Sedaris remains a guaranteed laugh-out-loud author who is also able to make you think and feel at the same time.

Happy-Go-Lucky is a collection of essays by humorist David Sedaris. It includes musings about travel, friends, family, long term relationships, death and the strange year we all had in 2020.

Like all this other writings Happy-Go-Lucky is laugh out loud funny with twinges of grief and pain underneath. David reminisces about his father leading up to his death at ninety-eight, people he’s met on the road, his long term relationship with Hugh and his siblings.

The chapter that was probably the most difficult for me was “Bruises”. It’s about a twelve year old French boy with a crush on forty-one year old David. It felt uncomfortable and I was embarrassed for this child and I wish it wasn’t included. Equally uncomfortable is “Lady Marmalade” where David remembers some of the inappropriate interactions that he and his siblings had with his father over the years culminating in his late sister Tiffany’s allegations of abuse.

With the exception of the two chapters I mentioned I enjoyed Happy-Go-Lucky and look forward to more from David Sedaris.

As always, Sedaris's stories swing from funny to uncomfortable and back again. I always find at least one essay in his collections that I want to print and send to my siblings, as his relationships with his siblings and parents are so interesting and sometimes relatable.

Like most people during the pandemic David Sedaris lost a family member with whom he had a complicated relationship. Lou was not a good man, a liar who would belitle his son and seuxlaize his daughters, much as David would sexualize an encounter with a young boy in France. And by young I believe the child was naked and twelve and in his bed. Hopefully unlike most people their fathers hadn't been accused of sexual abuse by one of their siblings. But David, Amy, and the rest didn't believe Tiffany and now she's dead by her own hand. They claim the suicide indicates she was mentally ill, but what if it was the only solace someone who was abused by someone who was supposed to love and protect them was left with after the rest of her family denied her truth? What's more, David seems destined to fill the void left by his father, commenting on things best left unsaid. Like most people during the pandemic David Sedaris's day to day life changed. He would wander the empty streets of New York for hours begrudging the loss of his favorite pastime, window shopping, while determined to get his steps in. After all he is a man who spent $5,000 on a fur coat not because he liked it but because if he didn't buy it someone else might or might not and he couldn't stand that. And what's $5,000 anyway? Unlike most people during the pandemic he continued living his life as he pleased, damn what anyone else thought. He'd host lavish dinner parties and bemoan why anyone would need a stimulus check. He'd not see the needed social change that brought about the BLM protests, instead he'd see ways to make his way across town in the swiftest manner possible by "joining" the protests . David Sedaris is the one percent. He doesn't see why he shouldn't live as he chooses. Random strangers on the street who have crooked teeth should be thankful if he's willing to pay to have them straightened so that he doesn't have to look at them. After all he had his own teeth straightened and they make him feel better, even if Amy and Hugh don't agree. It's David's world and everyone else is merely players, fodder for his stories. Because his gaze no longer looks inward so much as a gimlet eye out to eviscerate others.

I first read David Sedaris back in 2002. I got Me Talk Pretty One Day for a Christmas present and I was left deeply underwhelmed. But I think the reason the book was so successful is that people could relate to it. I know I read it and thought, I could write this. I'm not sure everyone had that reaction, but, what it boils down to is that they could see themselves in David. But now? He is so cocooned in his entitlement that he is completely detached from reality. I was either appalled or revolted, there was no inbetween. There is such a cringe factor I can't even. And it's not just the revelations about his father or the young boy in France, there was multiple levels of cringe from the sexual to just the plain out of touch. I came away from this book picturing David as Marie Antoinette with me baying for his blood. Not just because of his flaunting of Covid safety protocols, but the actual incomprehension that a check for half the price of his fur coat could actually matter to someone. You know what David? Those stimulus checks saved me. Repeatedly. I don't know what I would have done without them. And you, you look down your nose at them? I just can't with you. I literally just can't. Universal basic income is the way forward to a society with parity. But I guess now that you're part of the one percent with one apartment on top of another just "because" you wouldn't like parity. Not with your homes in France and England and North Carolina... All told Google is telling me you have eight homes. EIGHT!?! Which is also how many million he is worth. To play devil's advocate against my prosecution, some people in my book club pointed out that perhaps this book didn't "work" because it was written in lockdown. David Sedaris is known to travel constantly giving talks where he hones his material. OK, fine, perhaps that made this less "refined" of a book, but editing couldn't have made this less offensive. The only explanation is he's reached J.K. Rowling levels of fame and they just publish whatever he spews forth, and yes, at points he could easily be compared to that other hateful author. For myself I like to think of some intern gleefully sending this to press knowing that David's head would role because that intern was someone who needed their stimulus check.

I think I’ve read all if Sedaris’s essay collections over the last 15 years and this one didn’t disappoint. I love how terrible he and his family can be, because aren’t we all that way deep down inside? So good!

Only David Sedaris would write a book about his times during the pandemic titled "Happy-Go-Lucky". As ever, his ability to retell mundane events in his daily life leaves me crying with laughter.

I used to be a huge fan of Davis Sedaris. His first two books were exemplars of exceptional humor righting. However, I have been less than impressed with his output over the past decade or so. I am happy to report that this volume is thoroughly amusing. It is not really a return to form per se; it is more a maturing of form--in a good way.

I thought it was okay. It read like the other Sedaris books I have read before. It's still very funny but I feel like you have to be a specific kind of person to enjoy this one

Nobody does it like David Sedaris. I was totally taken by this collection and thought he balanced his signature humor with the darker subject matter this book covers well. Will definitely continue to follow him anywhere he decides to take us.

This was my first David Sedaris book, but it will not be my last. I have meant to pick up his works for some time, but I was still blown away. I loved the way that he perfectly balanced humor and heart, taking me from laughing to tearing up so effortlessly. I truly enjoyed this.

I would not necessarily recommend Happy-Go-Lucky as the jumping off point to David Sedaris. There was definitely a darker tone to this release than any of his previous stuff. Mind you, it has been a darker time in general the past several years. He touches on all things COVID in a deliciously David sort of way . . . .

“The terrible shame about the pandemic in the United States is that more than eight hundred thousand people have died to date, and I didn’t get to choose a one of them.”

To an outlier, he might come off as someone with nothing but first world problems, or a privileged white male, or a one percenter. To established fans, you are well aware that HE is well aware he is all of those things.

The death of his father is also covered in this book – and there definitely seems to be a sort of “talk” (written) therapy where he spits truths that he was perhaps not brave enough to mention while his father was still alive. When he wrote of his mother’s passing, I felt like I grieved with the family and cried the ugly cry – with Lou I felt like a stranger who walked in on a private conversation that was not meant for me to overhear. Perhaps those entries should have been saved for a future “Diaries” submission, or maybe left on the cutting room floor completely, but obviously it is David’s call with regard to what parts of his life he shares with the public.

That being said, along with some of the dark, there is most assuredly plenty of light. Stories featuring Amy are always my favorite and they abound here. David (and Hugh) also hopped back across the pond purchasing not only an apartment on the Upper East Side, but the neighbor to the Sea Section on Emerald Isle as well. While stories of “The Rooster” were certainly missed, Amy, Gretchen, Lisa and Hugh more than brought the hardy-hars.

I read this back in March and wasn’t sure what to say. My rating is obviously weighted, as I am a Sedaris superfan. I gave it a re-read to see if the uncomfortable entries were as uncomfortable as I originally thought, and YEP – sure were! Buuuuuuuut, no Sedaris experience is complete without a listen too, and his delivery on audio helped lighten the vibe considerably on some of the eyebrow-raisers.

For all the #tldr people out there all you need to know is I will most assuredly continue to put my bra back on whenever my Darling David beckons.

ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you, NetGalley!

Another solid book of essays by David Sedaris. You will laugh, you will cry...you may even cringe a little, but you will love this compilation of stories of David's life and family. I highly recommend it!
#NetGalley
#Happy-Go-Lucky

Thank you to NetGalley, Little Brown & Co., and David Sedaris for the ARC. One of Sedaris’ best. Loved the hilarious observations of the pandemic. #netgalley #happygolucky

I don’t read a ton of non-fiction but I couldn’t resist another David Sedaris and it doesn’t disappoint. He is so honest and witty and makes the crazy world go away for a while when you read his work.

⁉️Do you have any favorite comedians?
90s Adam Sandler, Will Ferrell and Mindy Kaling top my list, but I’m not well-versed in comics that do stand-up or write (near) exclusively tbh.

BOOK REVIEW
Happy-Go-Lucky by @davidsedarisbooks
Pub date: May 31, 2022
272 pages
@littlebrown

This was my first Sedaris, and I’ve immediately picked up another. This, full of those kind of out loud chuckles that catch you by surprise when reading, is exactly what I need when I’m in a bit of a reading slump. There was a lot of social/political commentary in here. Though l, nothing in this book takes itself too seriously, because the author himself doesn’t seem to, often with a sprinkle of self-deprecating humor in his storytelling.

I really enjoyed this and ate it up in a day. I mostly listened to the audio, which was fun since many “chapters,” were live performance recordings.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thanks @netgalley @littlebrown for the gifted ebook in exchange for my honest review.


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David Sedaris has always been one of my favorite writers of the modern era. His quick wit and sarcasm often capture an awkward situation perfectly. In the new collection of essays Happy-Go-Lucky, we see David deal with the death of his father, the awkward nature of having a home destroyed, and realize that David Sedaris has moved whole heartedly into his "get off my lawn" era of writing. From buying the upstairs unit in his building so he can escape at times to the difficulties of navigating a relationship with a long-term partner and the opinions of one' family, this book can be hilarious and heavy at the exact same time.

I have heard of David Sedaris. A lot. I haven't, though, read anything by him until now. I admit his writing is clever, but I guess I don't seem to have the sense of humor everyone else has. He admittedly has some strange encounters and even stranger stories to tell, which as an author is a good thing. I guess I thought this was more of a book than a series of short stories. Stories, that don't really seem to connect except across a linear path of time. I see other people's reviews say that this isn't one of his funniest books, so I will try to read something else from him before making an ultimate conclusion. But overall, I am not impressed.
*I received a copy of this book from NetGalley. This review is my own opinion*