David Sedaris's Happy-Go-Lucky, continues with his storytelling humor. Written within the last few years, the essays delve into some heavy topics along with his family, most particularly his relationship with his father.

If you've read any of his previous essay collections, you know and understand his sense of snarkey humor that can sometimes come off as condescending, which may turn off some readers.

Written within the past few years during Covid, HGL, refects Sedaris's observations on the shut down, people's behavior, the hoarding, and how it all affected him or in some ways didn't affect him. Given that covid ended his book tour and like many people he was trying to figure out what to do with all this free time. In Sedaris's case, walking 15 miles everday through an empty NYC, traveling, going to his other homes, hanging out with his family, and visiting his agenarian father at the nursing home. I get it you have a life of privilege since becoming a famous bestseller. In HGL it just comes across as insensitive.

At times the essays can be slightly political, but Sedaris manages to hardly be offensive. Having been a fan of Sedaris's since Me Talk Pretty One Day, HGL can't compete, though I still really liked it. The essays are quick reads. For those who are new to David Sedaris, my suggestion is to start with his earlier work and get or borrow the audiobook version if possible. The audiobooks narrated by Sedaris are even more hilarious.

Thank you Netgalley for the advanced copy, it is much appreciated.

This is a pretty classic David Sedaris book. I recently read A Carnival of Snackery (and didn't enjoy it) so I'm happy to read his more traditional form of writing. Many of these essays explore his relationship with family (and his father in particular). Similar themes from his diaries but much less monotonous of a read.

Another winner from Sedaris. This is my favorite since Me Talk Pretty One Day. I really appreciated the nuanced exploration of his father and their relationship. These are such hard things to write about it and he does it with such heart. You can really feel the gentleness beneath the cutting analysis.

This isn't my first Sedaris book and it won't be my last. Happy-Go-Lucky is another collection of essays that takes on the pandemic, the death of his father, his relationship with Hugh, and his siblings. It's another window into his mind and his humor.

What made this collection a little different than his earlier works is the more somber and complicated side of the Sedaris family. He talks about his father's death and their difficult relationship. He touches on his sister Tiffany's suicide and her accusations of abuse. While there are still humorous stories about his family, he also shares more about darker aspects, which makes his family feel more real and less like a bit in a comedy performance.

Sedaris also sheds more light on his relationship with Hugh, which makes sense since they spent much more time together during the lockdown. His observations of their 30-year-relationship, what he loves about him, and what drives him crazy were my favorite parts of the book.

This isn't my favorite Sedaris book - you can tell he was missing being on tour and practicing material, which may have affected how he wrote this book. But I still enjoyed it and recommend it to other Sedaris fans.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC!

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC of Happy-Go-Lucky by David Sedaris.

I ADORE Sedaris, I will read a note that he wrote on a used napkin. He is so dry, funny, insightful, and kind of terrible? Which only adds to his appeal, because we're all terrible, he just doesn't pretend that he's not.

There's not much to say about these essays except they are the same mixture of super random, and super vulnerable. He is able to poke light fun at really difficult periods in his life, specifically those to do with his family. As usual, I laughed out loud multiple times. I can always hear his distinctive voice in my head when I read his stuff. If you are a Sedaris fan, snag this book the minute you see it!

The running theme through this collection is the death of David Sedaris's father and his fraught (abusive, even) relationship with his father growing up. So perhaps not surprisingly, the essays are more thoughtful, more somber, and more likely to evoke a wry grin rather than the laugh out loud content of his earlier books. That doesn't mean these essays are any less enjoyable or well-written, but be prepared for more poignancy and maturity than you might expect based on his earlier works.

This is a book of essays which I prefer to diaries. Personal events, worldwide events and anecdotal events are all covered with good writing and sometimes ‘snort your coffee out your nose’ hilarity.
I haven’t seen a creepier cover in a long time so well done David Sedaris for the terrifying clown!!

I'm a huge David Sedaris fan so I admit I was going into this with pretty strong bias in his favor.
This collection of essays was moving, complex and yet still laugh out loud funny at times. His Father who has been a key character is in his past books is once again a major topic in the book. This time David takes a look at the difficult side of their relationship and this has some raw, tough moments that he shares. I also enjoyed his honesty on the trickiness of a long term relationship with his partner, it pulls the curtain back on some of their history but still told with the Sedaris wit. With his later books Sedaris has been tackling the indignities of middle-age but he had me chuckling along in full agreement with his observations.
I enjoyed reading this so much I'm excited to get the audio version to hear David read the stories out loud. If you have liked David's previous books you will love this one. 5 stars.
Thank you NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Another great essay collection from David Sedaris! Some of these pieces appeared in The New Yorker, but many I had never read before.

The big theme running through this book is the death of Sedaris' father, Lou. Sedaris has many thoughtful pieces on his conflicted feelings about his father. For the reader, the death is also poignant, because we've been reading about him for thirty years. It strikes me that Sedaris' decades of writing about his family has given his work the sweep of an epic novel.

Netgalley provided me a free ARC in return for a review of this book.

Whenever I look at the shelf where I keep all my David Sedaris books, I can remember what was going on in my life at the time that I was reading each one. Likewise, I can see the journey that David Sedaris has been on by the changes in how he writes and what he writes about. What remains the same about his essays is that they have been a comfort to me. I always intend to take my time and savor each essay when a new book comes out, but I always seem to rip right through it. That’s exactly what happened when I got an advanced copy of his forthcoming collection, “Happy-Go-Lucky”. He can still deliver a funny quip about his family and people he encounters with a cynical wink to his readers. The pieces that stood out the most to me were the ones where he talks about his father’s last days. At first, his bitter frankness comes off a bit jarring, but those moments are the most raw and real his words have ever gotten in any of his work. On the other hand, the places where he talks about the early days of the coronavirus and the lockdown might a little too recent in the collective memory to be fully enjoyed. Like his other books though, “Happy-Go-Lucky” will be a great collection to dip back into to remember particular moments in his life and yours as well.

Happy Go Lucky is classic David Sedaris, and I've read almost everything he's published. This book is a quick read about aging, grief, and the pandemic, on top of his classic themes of family, nostalgia, human nature, and finding humor in the mundane.. I typically listen to David's writings in the audio format, but I enjoyed this one in print more than I expected to.

My life truly wouldn't have been complete without hearing David's singularly outlandish take on American life in the pandemic years. He was in a unique position to observe and of course skewer the extremes of the country's covid response. He resumed his ambitious touring schedule as soon as he possibly could, worried that the world would go on without him. His speaking engagements and meet-and-greets fuel his funniest observations, so as soon as he was vaccinated he headed back out on the road. He describes the differences between blue and red states, finding the craziness and the humanity in both extremes.

This book also explores the death of his father, Lou Sedaris, who has loomed large for decades in every story about David's childhood. Longtime fans will devour this final exploration of his life and how the remaining siblings deal with the end of it. David eviscerates the platitudes that come along with the mourning process, perfectly pointing out how ridiculous it all sounds to the survivors.

If you love David Sedaris, you will be very pleased and satisfied with this book. My favorite parts were about the humiliations of aging and the joys/annoyances of being partnered for three decades and counting.

Thank you to NetGalley, Little, Brown, and Company, and the author for the gifted eARC in exchange for my honest feedback.

Upfront disclosure of my bias: I believe that David Sedaris is the funniest man on earth, and I will read and listen to everything he feels fit to share ‘til death do us part.

I’ve enjoyed his journals, yet was thrilled to see that Happy-Go-Lucky is a return to essays. As always, Mr. Sedaris allows us a look- at times raw- into his personal life and relationships. While some essays are lighter and pure fun, he also allows us into his father’s final days, as well as his sister Tiffany’s decline pre-suicide. Throughout is evidence of his prodigious ability to use language in the most concisely hilarious and heartbreaking way possible. I’ll re-visit these essays many times in the years ahead.

I was delighted to receive an ARC from NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company. I’m looking forward to listening to the audio version come the release date!

David Sedaris' HAPPY-GO-LUCKY is a collection of personal essays taken from diary entries, all written in his hilarious, but honest, voice. My favorite read was “A Speech to the Graduates,” but I also enjoyed the memories of book tours, Hugh’s cooking, traveling adventures, and dental surgery. Included are some serious essays, as he describes the death of his father and explores the still-present COVID epidemic, from the mad scramble for toilet paper, the outbreak of the sport of hoarding, and the presence of mask enforcers who point fingers and shame all violators.

This book is true Sedaris, a variety of offerings arranged like a buffet of tasty appetizers, with both sweet and salty. One essay plucks at the heartstrings while the next is ‘wet your pants’ funny. I enjoyed the refreshing and authentic look at everyday activities. And I feel like taking his advice and writing David a thank you note for the much-needed laughs that this book gave me

An excellent new set of essays from Sedaris! He has a knack for taking complicated topics and finding humor and poignancy. I recommend this new book to fans of his from the past and to new readers looking for an entry into Sedaris's work. I appreciate Sedaris's continued insistence that hope and joy are readily available, just close enough for us to find and experience. Great new work!

I have been a David Sedaris fan many years. Happy-Go-Lucky addresses some of the more somber moments of life, but with the same dry wit and wonder as readers have come to expect from him. The loss of his father leaving him"orphaned" in his 70's is something so many of us can relate to. The love he has for his sister Amy, and the stories of their shopping escapades are a look behind the curtain and into the heart of this grumpy little guy. His desire to connect to the constantly changing world is universal. HIs observations and and the rhythm or his exacting choice of language is his alone. While I read this e-galley, the best way to enjoy a David Sedaris work is truly to listen to him.
My thanks to NetGalley for the ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I feel like David Sedaris is an old friend. One I catch up with every time I read one of his books. The only thing better than reading one of his stories is listening to him read it.

I read my first David Sedaris book more than 20 years ago, and I was immediately in love. I still harbored dreams back then of being a writer myself, and Sedaris was who I wanted to be – snarky and cynical and so hilarious you’d guffaw out loud while reading him on an airplane (I did that more than once while reading Me Talk Pretty One Day).

Since then I haven’t missed a single Sedaris book, article, podcast appearance, interview or radio show. I follow him around like a lost puppy, hanging on both his written words and his reading of his own stuff on audio books and at live appearances. I met him once, several years ago, when he signed my copy of Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls, “To Emilie – let’s spit on Asian widows together.” I have no idea what it means but I’ve treasured it -- and the slightly inappropriate joke he told me while I was in the autograph line -- ever since.

That joke makes an appearance in his new book, Happy-Go-Lucky, and I greeted it like an old friend. Mostly because it’s one of the few things about the David Sedaris I know and love that is recognizable in this book.

For the first time, I didn’t finish a Sedaris book. I made it a little more than two-thirds of the way through it and decided I’d had enough. I don’t know what’s become of the Sedaris of old, but he has definitely left the building. All he left behind is a grumpy old man intent on tooting his own horn and airing dirty laundry – his and others’ – to the world.

Anyone who has read any of David Sedaris’ work knows all about his family – Hugh, his partner of 30+ years, along with his parents, five siblings, in-laws and teenage niece. He has always written about them with that unique combination so many of us feel for our relatives: exasperation and love in equal measures. Over the years he’s written about a thousand hilarious moments with his family, some of which he’s used to poke fun at himself, and some of which most definitely poke fun at them instead. He’s also written about his mother’s death, his sister Tiffany’s death by suicide, his difficult relationship with his father, and his family’s feelings about having all their private business out there in his books for the world to see. Through it all he writes about them with love, and it’s clear that the things he tells us about them – and about himself -- are (mostly) exaggerated for effect. It’s what writers do, right?

Somewhere along the way to this book, Sedaris seems to have finally gotten thoroughly sick of his siblings and his dad. He’s dropped the façade, and even poor Hugh comes out not looking too great. Sedaris is fairly vicious when talking about his dying 95-year-old father, describing how he “never cared about anything but money” and spent his life finding new ways to make his children feel worthless. I completely understand using your art to tell your truth about a parent, I applaud his right to do that, and if that’s what kind of father he had, I’m sorry for the pain it’s caused him. It just seems an abrupt switch for someone who’s been writing about this same father with love and tolerance for decades.

We get a description of what brats Hugh’s great-nephews are. We hear about how his sisters are getting old, and it’s a shame because they used to be beautiful. We learn that Hugh is often a grumpy pain in the ass whose moodiness is so bad David feels the need to defend him to his siblings. We read about a presumably closeted teen boy he knew who was coming to terms with his sexuality, and we get way too much information about his behavior – behavior that I’m sure that kid had no idea would end up in a book. Even people marginal to the story, like the nurses in his father’s nursing home, come in for his snarky wrath. I’m accustomed to Sedaris’ way of writing, and I realize kindness has never been his strong suit. But this was over the top even for him. At one point, Hugh accuses him of wishing he (Hugh) would get COVID just so he can write about it, and while I realize it was meant to be a joke, I'm not sure it really was.

More bothersome to me than the blatant hatred for everything and everybody, though, was his insistence on pointing out that he isn’t like the rest of us. He shops at Barney’s. His grocery store is “high-end.” He owns not one but two beach houses, along with his home in England and his two apartments in Manhattan -- the second purchased just because Hugh didn't like practicing the piano if David was in the apartment. He vacations in exotic places. Okay, we get it. You’re a successful writer and you spend money because you can. Talking about it non-stop just makes you sound like an elitist jerk. Yes, his readers are NPR listeners. No, we’re not all independently wealthy or even all that successful, thanks very much. We used to be able to identify with the things you wrote about. Now? Not so much.

It’s not that David Sedaris was ever much like the rest of us. I mean, who among us has served as an elf at Macy’s? But even when he was writing about something foreign to most of his readers, he had a way of making us feel like he was processing it just as we would. His humor, his cynicism and his obvious love for his people bridged any gaps of experience between him and his readers, allowing us in to his world so we could love his people too. Now he just seems annoyed with all of them and with us.

Glimmers of the old David Sedaris shine through now and then. He talks about how his happiest times are shopping with his sister, Amy, and it’s clear he adores Hugh, although it’s less clear why, based on what we see of him here. For me that was all overshadowed by the contempt that sometimes drips from his words. Also a turn-off: his descriptions of the pandemic dinner parties he held weekly (in New York, of all places, where a refrigerated truck full of bodies was parked near his apartment), and lines like this when discussing the protests surrounding George Floyd’s death: “In the early days of the protests there was looting . . . My fear was that my favorite stores would be emptied and that when the city finally opened back up again after the COVID restrictions there’d be nothing left for me to buy.” I know he’s a humorist, and I realize this was meant to get a laugh. But wow. It’s still harsh, especially coming from a white guy with money.

Several years ago, I read Sedaris’ Theft by Finding: Diaries (1977-2002). I loved every word, mostly because I felt like I was getting a behind-the-scenes look at so many of the situations and people I came to know in his later work. There was so much foreshadowing about places and people that would go on to be significant in his life and his writing, and for a true fan, it was wonderful to get a glimpse behind the curtain. This book has some of that same feel, but not in a good way.

If you have never read a David Sedaris book, I have two pieces of advice: first, listen to his books rather than reading them. He narrates his own audiobooks and they’re really great. Second, don’t start with this one. Go back to the Santaland Diaries or Me Talk Pretty One Day or Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim. Get to know that David Sedaris before you come back to Happy-Go-Lucky and wonder how he got here.

David Sedaris’ book is always a sure bet for me. His writings are consistently surprising, witty and thought-provoking. If you are a fan, you won’t be disappointed with this one. I have known some of the essays from The New Yorker, but read them again with pleasure.

What distinguishes this volume is a slightly darker mood, as the author deals with difficult topics such as the decline of his father (and their strained relations) or global pandemic - but you will also laugh a lot, that’s for sure.

Thanks to the publisher, Little, Brown and Company, and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book.

It was an absolute pleasure to delve back into David Sedaris' life with his latest essay collection Happy-Go-Lucky.

Let's all acknowledge the elephant in the room: the cover. It is scary, but don't let that throw you off. The book is filled with Sedaris' usual humour and his societal observations. The title is meant ironically, I believe. This is a heavier collection as it is the product of the past couple of years. Along with COVID-19, gun violence, Black Lives Matter, and the United States Capitol attack, Happy-Go-Lucky also covers the death of Sedaris' father in several of his essays. In a sense, the cover perfectly captures this time in history. After the past two years, don't you feel like a tired, disheveled clown?

My personal standouts were "Hurricane Season" and "Themes and Variations". In the first, Sedaris talks about his relationship as seen through the eyes of his siblings. Hugh remains one of my favourite "characters", only bested by When You Are Engulfed in Flames' Helen, of course. In the latter story, Sedaris shares with us how themes consistently seem to develop on his book tours, without his interference. This essay represents, in my opinion, a more classic Sedaris subject matter, and there was a real sense of comfort reading through his observations of the world. I did not hate the stories on historical events, we are all processing, but i think Sedaris shines best when writing about daily life. He has a real talent when it comes to picking up on peoples' (including his own) idiosyncrasies, and somehow taking the most casual observations and crafting a story around them.

His stories don't really have an ending. They linger, just hang there. Things are rarely resolved once the chapter ends. Often a person will start on a different conversation topic (e.g. a naked lady they spot in a nearby window) and that will be that. I don't hate it, in a sense it feels more real. Sedaris does not hold the answers to all problems, but that does not stop him from acknowledging things as they manifest around him.

Although not my favourite David Sedaris collection, I would recommend Happy-Go-Lucky to any reader of Sedaris' work. The laughs are farther apart than with his other books, less "in-your-face", but that does not mean the essays are left lacking. Indeed, they feel more reflective. My ultimate bucket list item would be for the chance to people-watch with David, Amy, and Gretchen!

Thank you NetGalley for the advance copy.

I have heard so many readers describe Sedaris’s work as hilarious that I was eager to see it for myself. His humor ranged from subtle and ironic to outrageous and barbaric—all very funny! His stories with their engaging characters and diverse settings grabbed and held my attention.

I was surprised to find myself agreeing with him on several topics: the importance of thank you notes, the need to throw down ones “lance” of parental gripes at some point, and the enjoyment of travel for speaking engagements.

Unfortunately, I also agreed with his partner on one important point: “I just don’t see the need for that language.”