A Carnival of Snackery: Diaries

Diaries #2

by David Sedaris

Picking up where his previous volume of diaries, Theft by Finding, left off, David Sedaris chronicles the years 2003–2020.
 

Genres: Humor, Nonfiction, Memoir, Audiobook, Essays, Biography, Comedy

577 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 5, 2021

About the author

David Raymond Sedaris is an American humorist, comedian, author, and radio contributor. He was publicly recognized in 1992 when National Public Radio broadcast his essay "Santaland Diaries". He published his first collection of essays and short stories, Barrel Fever, in 1994. His next book, Naked (1997), became his first of a series of New York Times Bestsellers, and his 2000 collection Me Talk Pretty One Day won the Thurber Prize for American Humor.
Much of Sedaris's humor is autobiographical and self-deprecating and often concerns his family life, his middle-class upbringing in the suburbs of Raleigh, North Carolina, his Greek heritage, homosexuality, jobs, education, drug use, and obsessive behaviors, as well as his life in France, London, New York, and the South Downs in England. He is the brother and writing collaborator of actress Amy Sedaris.
In 2019, Sedaris was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Reviews

[Regina · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Carnival of Snackery takes its name from a sampler offering on a menu David Sedaris once perused.

It’s a fitting title, because what he’s offering readers of his latest book is essentially a feast of little word snacks. Unlike his essay collections, this is 576 pages / 17 hours of short and seemingly random diary entries. Basically, if your most jaded, unfiltered self kept a journal of your daily experiences, conversations, and thoughts, it would look like this.

I always feel compelled to add the disclaimer that humor is subjective when sharing my thoughts on a book written for laughs, but never more so than when it’s for one by Sedaris. His brand of humor is unquestionably un-PC and often offensive. Sometimes it works for me, and sometimes it feels too cynical and mean-spirited.

A Carnival of Snackery DID mostly make me laugh, a lot. It has loads of jokes I felt compelled to relay to my husband, but I’d never feel okay sharing in mixed company. If off-color isn’t your color, Snackery is not for you. Also, if you voted for Trump, you’ve wandered into the wrong section of the bookstore and should redirect yourself accordingly. David Sedaris is not your people.

Like always, I chose the audiobook format since Sedaris is such an artful storyteller. While he narrates a large portion of this one, Tracy Ullman also performs large sections. His reasoning is that listeners often assume he’s a woman, so he might as well lean into that and have a little fun. It is a Carnival, after all.

Blog: https://www.confettibookshelf.com/

[Debbie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

Absurdist king of the universe!

I’m a fairly new Sedaris groupie. I went cuckoo over Calypso and When You Are Engulfed in Flames, and I have his other books on my short list. Sedaris is hysterical and cynical (in a laugh-y kind of way), and he sees the absurd in everything. He’s a really talented looker. I mean, I look and look, and so much of the time I miss the funny; I need new glasses so I can see it better. Meanwhile, he gets me going and makes me go down my own memory lanes of the absurd—and make lists, lol (my favorite occupation!) and for that I’m grateful. It’s a good book when it can make you remember funny stuff.

This book is a collection of journal entries from 2003 to 2020. It’s chock full of goodies—jokes, bumper stickers, T-shirts, and bizarre conversations, especially on planes and at book signings. And there are puns galore; he’s one clever guy. As he mentions in the Preface, his entries have a lot to do with mice, litter, and travels. Who isn’t all ears when you hear THAT list? One very cool thing he does is incessantly collect litter, which he says has become a habit. He does this where he lives part-time in England. The town has even named a garbage truck after him!

And his travel! I had no idea he went to so many book readings—and all over the world! There are millions! (He had numerous readings in Asia, which surprised me for some reason.) He prefaced each entry with the location, which made it look like he was on the road nonstop, switching from one far-away city to the next without a break. In fact, he just didn’t include a lot of entries in-between his trips. Makes sense—his travel provided a lot of copy; when he was home there was less excitement, less people to talk to.

Occasionally, there’s an entry that he already used in his books of essays, but it wasn’t annoying because I liked hearing about the scenes again. A couple of times we got to hear about where his weird book titles came from. For example, his book Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim came as a direct quote from his partner, Hugh’s, dream! Really fun!

In the Preface, he says this:

“Given a choice between writing about the Arab Spring uprisings and a beggar calling out—as one recently did to a woman walking ahead of me—'Hey, you got a hole in your ass’—I’ll go with the latter.”

This sums up his take on reality perfectly, and it’s a world where I want to live, too.

But despite my groupie-ness, I have two big complaints:

-This book is LONG. 576 pages long. I kid you not. Had I known the page count, I wouldn’t have requested a review copy. It’s not fun to read short entries for such a long time. At least with a novel, you have something that flows, happenings that go together. Here, there are snippets of fun and wisdom, but they don’t relate to each other. There are some less funny moments that could have been edited out. Actually, he could have made more money by keeping all the content but making it two books instead of one. Readers would have bought both, I know it. But let’s be clear—despite its zillion pages, I was never bored. It was just choppy is all.

-He crosses the line once, and it’s really not okay. Part of Sedaris’ charm is that he’s outrageous. He has “snarky” down pat, and it’s hard not to crack up. And occasionally he tells you something just for the shock value (e.g., a dog with his eye falling out, ewww!). Well, once, he went too far. It was a joke about pedophilia. I can barely write this, it made me feel so sick. The fact that he could say something so twisted, let alone think it, messes with my head. I love him, but how can I love someone who says THAT? He says another thing that crossed the line, but it’s not as egregious. This one showed contempt for his audience (he wrote an obscene and mean autograph), and I just hate it when a celebrity disses their innocent and loyal fans like that. I can handle crude (which these things are), but here he goes from crude to disgusting and immoral. The first comment I spoke of made me want to puke; the other one just left a really bad taste in my mouth.

I struggled with how to rate this one. The hugundous page count and the severe Line Crossing both detracted from my enjoyment of the book, so instead of giving it 4 stars, which was my original plan, I’m settling on a 3.5, rounded down. The unfortunate thing for me is that my love for Sedaris will forever be tainted because of that one horrible joke he made. That sucks. I still want to read all his books, but I’m not as excited about it as I used to be.

Thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy.

[Liz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Strange, strange, strange… This book is a collection of Sedaris’ diary entries from 2003-2020. While it was an interesting reminder to see what was happening in some of the earlier years, and there were some wild stories, there were also chunks that just didn’t work for me. At over 500 pages, there's a lot of material here and it’s very uneven. A tighter editing job was needed. I did learn a new phrase. Who knew vaginal tenacity was the female equivalent of “balls”?
I do recommend the book for those that love to see the weirdness in humans. If you like looking at pictures of Walmartians, you’ll probably enjoy this book. If you cringe at poor grammar, you’ll recognize yourself in Sedaris. If you love horrible jokes, you’ll have fun. I didn’t so much laugh at the stories as shake my head. If political incorrectness offends you, stay far, far away from this book.
In summary, as you would expect from Sedaris, it’s a weird book. If you’ve not read Sedaris before, I would recommend starting with one of his books of essays instead of this.
My thanks to Netgalley and Little, Brown for an advance copy of this book.

[Tracy P. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have been enthralled by David Sedaris since the first time I heard one of his performances. With 'A Carnival of Snackery' Mr.Sedaris has upped his ante yet again - and thus making it my favorite audiobook of his to date. Tracey Ullman narrates the sections David does not and she is the perfect choice - the ultimate icing on the cake.
David discusses his life between 2003-2020 with raw honesty, and this is what makes him such a favorite of mine. He has no shame in his game and speaks about his life with no filter. From gay marriage, to his bigoted father, the loss of his sister, Trump politics, racism, and the general idiocy and ignorance he finds around him in his daily life.
David has a huge heart and it shines bright when he visits his father who now resides in a nursing home. He expresses how sad he feels to see him losing his cognitive skills and physical abilities. The forgiveness and compassion is palatable. - and what a good example for me in my own life.
I belly laughed so hard it hurt (and also shed a few tears) as David discusses the good, the bad and the ugly of his life. A truly a matchless phenom in the art of storytelling, no one can transform random everyday mundanities into stomach aching hilarity like he does. - Soooo incredibly grateful for the countless hours of sheer joy and laughter he has brought into my life.

[Laura Sackton]

I guess I'm over David Sedaris. I loved Theft By Finding, his first volume of diaries, and now I have no idea if that book was a lot less ableist and offensive than this one, or if I've just lost my patience for white men's bullshit. In any case, while there are some truly hilarious and delightfully weird anecdotes and observations in this, there are also lots of ableist jokes, outdated and offensive language, and this whole exhausting attitude along the lines of "why are young people so sensitive, it's so sad I can't make offensive jokes in peace anymore!"

I was turned off by Sedaris when I saw him live a few years ago and he opened the night by talking about how annoying microaggressions are. That's also how he ends this book—by complaining about microagressions and how things have changed so much (he's annoyed by the term Latinx). And I get that being mean and judgmental is kind of his thing. But it's just not funny. It's exhausting and frustrating and gross. I did a lot of cringing while listening to this. And those cringey parts made it much harder to enjoy the truly funny bits, because in the back of my mind I was just thinking, wow, just another white man taking up space and refusing to accept and celebrate...actual progress. Being mean and grouchy and judgmental and fascinatied by the grotesque is one thing. Being blatantly ableist and calling it funny is something else, and it's not something I want any part of.

[Arienna · Rating 2 out of 5]

David Sedaris touches on this in his last chapter but I think he's aging out of this game. He doesn't understand the modern world well enough to make witty observations about it and his life is so privileged just observing his own world has gotten a bit uninteresting. I still bought the book and moderately enjoyed it but it dragged on, much like catching up with an old friend who's gotten really into a lot of things you have no interest in.

[Angie Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love listening to David Sedaris. I love reading his essays, too, but to me, listening to him read his own essays is just a different experience altogether. I love how honest he is in these diaries, saying things that sometimes make me cringe. I know this is ridiculous, but it makes me feel closer to him, like we're actually friends or something, to listen to him CONFIDE in us (because that's what it feels like, that he's confiding some of his most shameful secrets, trusting that we won't judge him too harshly). I'm now going to google whether his father is still doing okay...

[Krista · Rating 3 out of 5]

Frank and Scott went to an Indian restaurant the other night and took a picture of the menu, which offered what it called “a carnival of snackery.”

Carnival of Snackery is about as random and shallow as that opening quote suggests: Covering the years 2003-2020, David Sedaris returns with the second volume of his personal diaries, but unlike Theft by Finding (which I thought was fascinating and illuminating; I’ve read a lot by Sedaris and seeing the source material felt like a gift), this followup feels a bit forced. Put a different way, and using an expression I don’t really like, the first volume — written when Sedaris was struggling and figuring himself out — felt like “punching up”, whereas this half — featuring an aging Sedaris who is oddly preoccupied by getting “edgy” about marginalised communities — feels like “punching down”; but maybe even lazier than that, maybe “pointing down”. Sedaris still has the rare gifts of close observation and turning what he sees into clever and biting commentary, but it gets a little rote here; he has perfected his style, and even in his so-called personal diary, he’s writing for an audience. There were laughs, but also some cringing, maybe even some sighs of irritation. (Note: I read an ARC through NetGalley and passages quoted may not be in their final forms.)

“What did people do before they took pictures of everything?” I whispered to Dawn as we accidentally invaded one photo after another. It was just as bad later on at what amounted to the Village of Yesteryear, a re-creation of a Bedouin encampment. There were a lot of Russians there, all raising their cell phones. The camera has replaced actual looking and turned life into evidence. It drives me crazy.

David Sedaris has written before that he deliberately puts himself out into the world every day, looking for experiences and conversations to write down in his notebook; he might not be looking at the world through his cellphone, but I don’t get the sense that he lets himself just freely experience life (without, you know, turning it “into evidence”.) This book has Sedaris travelling between his homes in England, France, and the U.S.A., circling the globe on an endless book tour, and if he isn’t soliciting a hired driver’s life story, he’s asking audience members at his book signings to tell him a joke. And he gets plenty of great material that way. He also runs across a surprising number of mice, monkeys, and slugs, and when he’s not writing about some morbid fascination he has with people who are missing limbs, he’s writing about a morbid fascination he seems to have with people in wheelchairs:

After wandering through bookstores yesterday, I went to the British Museum for a piece of cake. Beside me sat an English family with three children, the youngest of whom was in a wheelchair. The boy looked happy enough, but surely it was momentary. A pleasant half hour in the café and then it was back to a lifetime of being patronized and stared at. I was just admiring his bravery when his mother rolled him away from the table, and I saw that his leg was in a cast. Then I noted that the chair was a rental and put it together that he wasn’t crippled, just laid up for a few weeks. This sort of thing has happened before, and it always leaves me feeling betrayed — as if the child had intentionally aroused my pity.

I dunno — I guess that has the classic set-up, misdirection, punchline of a standard joke. How about this one:

At Marks and Spencer I emptied my basket onto the belt, saying, “I don’t need a bag, thank you.” Then I watched as my cashier, who wore a badge reading HEARING IMPAIRED, put my items into a bag and charged me ten p. for it. When we tell the disabled they can do anything they want in this world, don’t we mean that they can invent a new kind of alarm system or write a book about loneliness — something, well, that can be accomplished at home?

Is that edgy, or cruel? What about:

I saw in the Tribune that starting September 1, all Marriott hotels will go completely nonsmoking, meaning that I will never again stay at a Marriott. Also in the news is the continued bombing of Lebanon. Fifty children were killed on Saturday and because there’s no wood for coffins, wild dogs are eating their bodies.
I read that and thought, Really, all Marriotts will be nonsmoking?

Yeah, I don’t get a lot of yuks out of dead children jokes.

“A man loses his soul when he has two houses or two women.” This is an old Italian proverb and though I’d love to reject it, I suspect that truer words were never spoken. It was Stefania who quoted it to me, and after it had sunk in, I asked if a man might regain his soul by having three houses.
“I don’t think it works that way,” she said.
“Four?”

I don’t really know how many homes Sedaris owns (because this is a diary and not a comprehensive narrative, he can note that he’s buying a new house without mentioning selling a different one, but he does stop referencing his French country home after buying the English country home; that leaves the Paris and London apartments, the North Carolina oceanside property, the apartment in the Village, and the Upper East Side duplex), so what does that do to a man’s soul; to an artist’s soul? (At a minimum, I think he’s won Monopoly.) Sedaris reports telling people he’s rich (while always refusing the change people ask him for on the street), and he apparently told his father that he doesn’t need to worry about the Sedaris family name dying out so long as he has nine million books in print, and I guess you have to be really well off to wear expensively shredded clothes from Comme des Garçons, or joke that the worst thing about the pandemic was losing Executive Platinum status on American Airlines. Honestly, I think he was funnier when he was hungrier.

I didn’t just turn older this year — I turned old. There wasn’t a specific single moment when I slipped over from middle age; rather, it was gradual, the change not so much physical as mental. There are so many things I don’t understand now. Our constant need to rebrand, for instance. Someone politely referred to me as “queer” not long ago, and I was like, Oh no, you don’t. I was queer in the 1970s, and that was enough for me.

Now in his sixties, at least Sedaris is aware that he’s too establishment to really pass himself off as subversive; even the cussing and sex jokes aren’t really shocking to a modern reader (and the mocking of less powerful groups [including children] just seems in bad taste.) I understand that these are diary fragments; I also understand that Sedaris writes these entries with a future audience in mind and was able to select which bits to use for this volume, and I guess I just wanted something rawer and truer.

[Kelly (and the Book Boar) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Is it a good quality or a bad quality that I imagine all of my reviews to be terrible? Is one more narcissistic than the other?

If you’ve been around more than a minute you are well aware that my love for David Sedaris has no end. And while all of his collections are obviously non-fiction, being able to climb inside his brain and roll around for a bit via these diaries just hits different. All the Stars. He’s my darling.

Favorite entry hands down . . .

I went to bed at three and shortly afterward Hugh woke up, and we talked for a while. He’d dreamed that he was walking past a house and saw a man on the front porch reading a book called Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim. I got up and wrote the name in my notebook. If it’s not too late, his dream will be a prophecy. Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim. I think that’s a great title for my new book.



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

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

We listened to this together during our son's recent visit. We listened while on our southern road trip, continued after we arrived back home, and finally finished it in the departures lane of the airport, before waving our son off on his journey back to England. I loved the narration, which was a sort of relay back and forth between the author and Tracey Ullman, whom I discovered in the 1980s in England. It was truly delightful to hear her voice again, especially as she performed different accents and dialects. In fact, having two narrators added depth and kept me engaged.

There were moments when we laughed out loud, others where we recoiled in disgust, and others still where we leaned right in and listened intently. I felt a sense of being alongside this flawed and unique person who is David Sedaris, as if he were telling me about his experiences in an intimate setting. I felt especially moved by his accounts of the medical tests he has undergone, and when listening between-the-lines of his relationship with his father.

One phrase that stood out to me was when Sedaris talks about his parents' relationship and asks of himself and his siblings, "What did we know of the wear and tear, the slow bleed of a thirty-five year marriage?" I think that sums up the book for me, it's about a mature adult aging into seniorhood, a realization of what do we really know about our parents' relationship, and an understanding that we are stepping into our parents' shoes, as they age into whatever's next after this life.

[Diane Barnes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not much to be said about diary entries, but I loved every minute of reading it.

[Scratch · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very reluctant 3 stars.

David Sedaris didn't expend enough effort upon this book. Random diary entries are stitched together, basically in chronological order, but jumping around between countries without explanation. This isn't like some of his earlier, fantastic works. "Me Talk Pretty One Day" and "Naked" both had actual chapters, and those chapters had some careful thought put into themes. Even "When You are Engulfed in Flames" used diary entries to chronicle his progress in quitting smoking and learning Japanese.

Not so here. There are many entries that mention David Sedaris' knowledge of foreign languages, but these are scattered and confusing. He learns a few phrases of Ukrainian, but doesn't ever tell the reader whether he sticks with it to try to become fluent. He mentions French and a smattering of other languages. There is even a scant reference to learning a single sentence of ASL toward the end of the book. The reader is just left confused by how many languages one man needs to learn.

Towards the end, the book resolved itself into chronicling the pandemic and social unrest we all were living with through 2020. And Biden's election to the presidency. Of course, by that point the book was covering material that all of us have lived through, so it became both more interesting and less interesting at the same time.

I actually enjoyed the article Sedaris wrote several years back about the death of his sister, Tiffany. I believe the title was, "Now We are Five," or something to that effect. It was poignant and relatable, particularly for any of us who have relatives like Tiffany. (My sister-in-law has the exact same personality as Tiffany and nearly all the exact same problems.)

But if fans loved that article, they are in for a bit of an emotional tailspin with this book. The events immediately leading up to her death, and shortly after, are still included in this book. But the article itself, going into the meatier facts and emotions surrounding her death, are all gone. Instead, we have meaningless unrelated vignettes, some lasting less than a page, wherein David Sedaris writes down jokes he learned from audience members at book signings.

Disappointing.

Final point--

One diary entry contained a truckload of information. David Sedaris was apparently raped by 3 different men, and he agrees that that is a large number. Then, after nearly 30 years together, David finally learned his long-time boyfriend Hugh had also been raped once as well. ... These revelations appeared in one diary entry, and were never followed up on.

If Sedaris had written a book just about homosexual rape, I would have read the fuck out of that. No, not because I love rape, but because I am also gay and was raped. There is so much untapped material there. He could describe each of the rapes, as well as his shame/fear that it happened again. He could go into the homophobia of the 80s and 90s that led him to believe he couldn't report it. Some measure of dry, self-deprecating humor would make such a difficult subject more tolerable.

People could scold me that this subject might be way too emotional for Sedaris. But, to be fair, he spent so many pages talking about his colonoscopy, his father's incontinence and looming death, and his sister's suicide. He even volunteered the information about his rapes; he just didn't follow up with the details.

David Sedaris-- take the time to write a real fucking book.

[Sonja Arlow · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like HOW David Sedaris says things more than the actual words he is saying so I was a little surprised that he commandeered Tracy Ulman to help with the narration.

He explained his reasons why, but her sections made me a lot more aware of what was said.

The diary entries were sometimes ordinary, sometimes funny and at times completely irrelevant and too short to have any meaning to anyone but the author.

The diary entries span from 2003 through 2020 so there is a bit of history I found interesting.

It was not a bad way to spend my time, but his earlier work was a lot funnier to me than this one.

Only recommended for hard core Sedaris fans.

[Jessaka · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okay, I will elect him as the best comedianbut then again, I don't listen to other comedians, much less, buy their books. He was an accident not by his mother, but by the name of a book he wrote: "Calypso." I picked it up because I thought that it was about the Caribbeans. And I have been hooked ever since. In this book, he states that people say that he sounds like a woman when he speaks, So half of his audiobook is spoken by a woman who is pretending to be him.

Anyway, I think that he is quite crazy, How else can he come up with this stuff?

[Ken]

By rights this 568 pager should be read in fits and starts, dipping in and dipping out, while you're reading another book with some narrative arc. That works fine when you own the book, but what if it is owned by a library, and you can only renew so many times?

Right. You read coast-to-coast. From sea to shining sea. And so, the episodic nature of diary entries are forced into a role they're not best suited for.

It's a mixed bag of goods, these diary bits. Some are extended anecdotes or vignettes. Some are jokes Sedaris heard from his many, many fans who come to readings. Some are humorous exchanges Sedaris had with family members, with drivers, with cashiers, with readers, with the greater public he runs into as he performs or picks up trash. He is a fanatical crusader against litter and England, apparently, is rife with them. He wouldn't do so well in my hometown in Maine, either. Bud Lite cans sprout roadside overnight like blue mushrooms. That and McDonald's bag and plastic Dunkin Donuts cups, tops impaled by a straw. Bring your trash bag and join us in our town, David!

You get the date, the location, and the punchline. Yes, Sedaris is very big on finishing these pieces, long and short, with a punch line. For example, here are two short entries:

October 8, 2010
Atlanta, Georgia

Message on a T-shirt worn by a big-breasted woman at last night's show: I WISH THESE WERE BRAINS.


December 28, 2015
Rackham

My father went to Paul's for Christmas and everyone winced when a friend of Sandra's dropped by. The woman had just lost 165 pounds, and on hearing it, Dad said, not "Congratulations" or "That must have been tough," but rather "I'll bet you're a real sight to see in the shower."

And people accuse me of having no filter.


As the diaries cover 17 years (2003--2020), you wind up reliving some moments you'd rather not. Through the lens of Sedaris' outrage, we get the Dylan Roof mass murders, the Trump election, the George Floyd atrocity. Toward the end, Covid arrives, depriving Sedaris of one thing it never denied any of us -- an audience.

This guy lives to perform. He loves interacting with people. He loves asking them off-color, off-the-cuff questions, going home, and noting their answers. He proves, like the Candid Camera of old, that people do and say the darnedest things.

As is true with his books (granted, I've read only two), his personality comes through in a big way. And his humor. Probably a dozen times (not bad for 568 pages!), I had a quick belly laugh over some joke, one-liner or other.

In that sense, worth it. And certainly a diversion against bad news, even though we can't kid ourselves and have to remain vigilant against bad news, especially where it concerns our future. Which all means, I'm moving from this (ha-ha) to the serious business of On Tyranny Graphic Edition: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century.

Some things are no laughing matter, Trump and Cronies being one of them. I think Sedaris would join me in that sentiment. Better yet, I know it.

[Rennie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve liked reading his diary volumes more than I’ve liked his last couple of essay collections. I loved Theft By Finding so much that I was checking publishers’ catalogs every year to see if it would finally be the year for this second volume. It’s just mesmerizingly entertaining to get this peek into how his wonderfully weird brain works. It’s maybe a little voyeuristic but I find his diary entries strangely reassuring too — other people get upset by and ruminate on dumb bad encounters with strangers for way too long too, or have thoughts that even shock you, the thinker of them. Even the way he writes about sad or sentimental moments is just so lovely.

And also — not to have read his diaries and decided the most important element was me — but his style of reflection and the way he observes and interacts with people makes me look at the world around me differently too. We overlook so much even in seemingly mundane moments or simple interactions and he’s so good at finding meaning or humor or connection or just amusement in them. He makes me a little more able to do that too, and bless his gruesome, grotesque little heart for that.

He’s not everyone’s cup of tea so if you were even lukewarm about the previous diaries or are sensitive about language or shocked at sudden mentions of dicks or worse don’t even bother. If you loved the other book and don’t mind his particular brand of boundary testing you’ll be equally devastated when you get to the end of this volume. I’m just disappointed that this is really the end of it now and only if he lives another 20 years will we get another volume. I mean I really hope he does live that long, but I don’t want to wait.

[Shannon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Of all of Sedaris's writing, his diaries are by far my favorite, not solely because I have a general interest in reading the diaries (and letters) of others, but mostly because it reminds me to pay closer attention to my own life. There is an interesting story in our lives every single day, whether it's a conversation or observation, a joke that was told, a headline in the paper, a text between friends; and these are worth documenting especially when they're documented well. I used to keep Theft by Finding on my nightstand to pick up and flip through when I bored of my own diary-keeping, and not only do his entries make me laugh out loud but they instantly improve my own diaries as well.

While reading this volume, I also had the epiphany that Sedaris feels almost familial to me, and it was through these entries that I realized how much he reminds me of one or two of my most beloved relatives, the ones I am flattered to be related to, the ones whose quick-wit and unpredictable conversational segues make me laugh with the same abandon as his irreverent humor.

[Tania · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my eighth read/listen by David Sedaris, and I thoroughly enjoyed this one. As always, I'll start by saying that his irreverent and sometimes snarky humor is not for everyone, but he had me laughing out loud every few minutes. I love how honest he is about himself, not trying to sugarcoat anything he thinks or does. I also like travelling with him to all the weird and wonderful places he visits on vacation and book tours. Tracey Ullman narrated parts of A Carnival of Snackery, and although there was nothing wrong with her narration, listening to David reading his own stuff is the real deal.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

SUCH a weirdo! These little diary entries are fascinating, because you see where he gets the ideas for his essays, or where he basically "tries out" new material by writing down things he's seen and heard. He loves to collect jokes, both stupid and dirty, and to meet new people and know their stories. He's also flawed, selfish, and has major daddy issues. And he's not ashamed to admit it, bless his heart.

[Jinjer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Why this book? I was bummed that I was nearing the end of the first volume of David's diaries when I suddenly noticed a second volume was being published in October 2021! And there is an elephant on the cover!

Jump to December 2021. After being on the library wait list for two months, the Kindle version finally became available. It was worth the wait! Just as good as Volume I. Could not put it down. I would say the main thing I love about David's diaries is that they are full of every day observations of wacky things that people say and do. As he said himself "Where there are cars & trains & buses & planes, there's going to be tension and ugliness. There's nothing I find more compelling."

The people in his life are so interesting to hear about.

There's Tiffany who never has money and is always getting into crazy situations.
Lisa who talks to everyone...store clerks, gas station attendants, bag boys.
Hugh, who we love, but can get mad about the most puzzling things.
Hugh's mom who only sees the good in everything when traveling. "They left a chocolate on my pillow, just like a little fairy!"
Susie the media escort "Steer her to a topic, sit back and enjoy yourself."
David's dad!

Dad (reviewing his will): When I die, the Sedaris name dies with me.
David: Speak for yourself! Mine is on like 9 million books!

I like when, at book signings, he'll ask some questions of each person that he's signing for and then shares their crazy answers with us, such as this question to the guys "Would you share a piece of pie with another man, in a restaurant?"

Hopefully there will be a Volume III in 10 years or so.

[Michelle Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is ultimate Sedaris - seriously honest, seriously serious, seriously funny, and seriously sad.

I made a real error in judgment when I read this book - I read it while my teens were sleeping and laughed so much at some of the 2003 entries that I woke them (in my defense it was noon and I’d been waiting since the early hours to start reading).

I honestly think this is one of the best of David’s books, and I’ve read them all. There is so much in this one. He has a true gift of writing down his observations in such a way that makes the absurd, the inane, and the heartbreaking come across, at once, as relatable to the reader.

Read or listen to this - you can’t go wrong either way.


e-Reader copy kindly provided by Little, Brown and Company and NetGalley. Opinions shared are my own.

[Jill H. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sedaris picks up his diary entries from 2003-2020 in this follow-up of his previous book about his earlier diaries. And they are just as insanely funny. Granted,some readers don't particularly appreciate his skewed sense of humor and views of life and there there is no black or white.....you either love him or you can't stand him. I adore him and find his musings delightful. He is one of a kind!

[Vovka · Rating 2 out of 5]

There were moments where the jokes in this book made me laugh hard enough for tears to fall down my cheeks. There were moments where I felt compelled to re-share the jokes with friends and family. But there were also moments where David Sedaris fell on the wrong side of the values system I thought he ascribed to, and where he deeply disappointed me.

An entry:

"January 5, 2014, London. At M&S, I emptied my basket onto the belt saying, 'I don't need a bag, thank you.' Then I watched as my cashier, who wore a badge reading, 'HEARING IMPAIRED,' put my items into a bag and charged me 10p for it. When we tell the disabled they can do anything they want in this world, don't we mean they can invent a new kind of alarm system, or write a book about loneliness? Something, well, that can be accomplished at home?"

This pissed me off. This privileged jerk telling folks with physical handicaps to "stay home" because he struggled to communicate with them in a store? This flavor of gross "punching down" humor isn't common in the book, but it's common enough that it's greatly reduced my desire to continue to read his works. This is an example of one of the numerous times when he shows ignorance of his own privilege, and where he insists that service people are there as fodder for his jokes. Why didn't he just get the cashier's attention and communicate, "no bag" another way?

Another example:

"January 18, 2017, London. As of yesterday, the London Underground announcements will no longer begin with 'Ladies and Gentlemen.' Gender-queer people said it made them feel excluded, so now the conductors will say, 'Hello, Everyone.' There's something sad about this to me. It's like a casual Friday for language, only it's not just on Friday. I rather liked being thought of as a gentleman. 'Yes,' I'd think whenever I heard it, 'I believe I'm up for this.' As for the people who once felt excluded, what will this honestly do for them?"

Sedaris would rather "feel like a gentleman" than allow a non-binary person the dignity of feeling included -- or at least not specifically excluded -- in public address systems. What the hell is his problem?

Another example:

[Talking about Trump's bible photo op stunt in DC during the Black Lives Matter political unrest.]
"Hugh frowned out the window, "We just can't win." I think he meant a universal 'we,' as looking out the window of your Upper East Side duplex is pretty much the definition of winning. Conspiracists are certain that George Floyd is still alive, and that Derek Chauvin is an actor."

I don't get why he felt the need to insert himself and his wealth into a serious anecdote about Black Lives Matter.

A little later:

"Last week, I put on those ridiculous exfoliating socks. [Here Sedaris shares a bunch of weird detail about shed foot skin.] 'So you see, I really couldn't do anything,' I'll say, when asked what I did during the Great Uprising of 2020. Then again, I'm a bit uncomfortable in the role of ally. In the end, I'll do what people like me do. I'll donate some money and then tell everyone I donated twice that amount."

Ok, here at least he shows some self awareness of the despicable nature of self-centered performative allyship, but something still feels amiss about the way he sloughs off the protests and refuses to genuinely grapple with his privilege.

In the end, this book made me far less interested in reading future Sedaris books.

[Jason Koivu · Rating 5 out of 5]

The elf has still got it!

[Brandon · Rating 3 out of 5]

David Sedaris returns with his second collection of diary entries. A Carnival of Snackery spans from 2003 all the way up to 2020.

This is a hard one to review and it will entirely depend on if you’re already a big fan of David’s work. By no means should anyone begin their Sedaris journey with either collection of diary entries as both are more of an unfiltered look at the inner workings of David’s mind rather than the polished essays he’s most known for. It’s like watching the special features on a DVD without watching the movie.

A lot has happened both in David’s life and the world in the seventeen years that make up this collection. Big cultural moments like the beginning of the war in Iraq, the 2005 terrorist attacks in London (while David was a resident there), the political rise of the far right and the election of Donald Trump and the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic all make appearances. We also unfortunately encounter the loss of David’s sister Tiffany to suicide, David’s fractured relationship with his father and many a health scare.

It’s obviously not all gloom and doom, however. David is first and foremost a humorist, so the book has more than its fair share of laugh out loud moments; the best being jokes and insults he’s told at book signings.

“You’re so lazy, you would shit the bed and push it out with your foot.”

“The lowest of the low. You’re so low you could get under the belly of a snake wearing a top hat.”

There are definitely other highlights here like David’s unusual relationship with a fox who had visited his home every day looking for scraps, much to the chagrin of his partner Hugh. His interactions with readers at book signings often keep the events going long – sometimes over 5 hours – one highlight being how soon women remove their bras following their work day.

Like THEFT BY FINDING, I can’t see me recommending this to someone who hasn’t already read a good chunk of David’s work, but I did have an enjoyable time seeing these snapshots of David’s day-to-day life

[Theo Logos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Davis Sedaris is not a snack to everyone’s taste. If he were a candy, it would have a small gooey center of sweet human kindness and genuine familial love surrounded with a thick, hard shell covering of bitter cynicism and snark. He’s the black licorice of humorist.

If you have the taste to enjoy his snarky humor, this book is essential. Rather than essays or stories, these are excerpts directly from his diary, the unadulterated source from which he builds his essays. Fast and pithy, these gems give a peek into how he turns his life into art. This is how the bitter candy is made.

[Michelle Curie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've always been curious of other people's diaries. How people process their thoughts, and also what they deem important enough to actually preserve is such a telling thing. Me reading this is a testament to my curiosity: after all, I have never heard of David Sedaris before and yet here I was, ready to dive into his mind.



A Carnival of Snackery is collecting seventeen years of writing. That's actually an insane period of time, just think about everything that has happened over the last two decades! I quickly figured out that Sedaris is an American living in the UK, who uses his dairy to mainly observe.

This is a collection of bizarre and odd behaviours, finding humour and sass in everyday situations. He's quite a savvy one, this Sedaris! There's a throwaway quality to the moments he pens down, often moments that would otherwise be forgotten. Who cares about the woman you passed on the street yesterday? And yet, with his quick and sharp way of telling a story, there's often something funny about how people make appearances in these stories.

This isn't particularly profound, but entertaining and unfiltered. Sedaris definitely doesn't hold back, and he's often shamelessly complaining and offending. It never felt mean-spirited to me though, but I guess whether cynical humour is something you find pleasure in is really up to each individual (if you're sensible in this regard, stay away! There's explicit talk in this, as well as jokes about pedophilia for example). What I ended up being impressed with is how well he is at observing things. It takes talent to see a story worth telling!

All in all, this was a light read that was fun to slip in and out of every now and then. It's absurdly long for what it is (and then again, isn't, after all, it does cover the span of seventeen years), so I don't think I could have read this in one go, but I came back to it in between other reads or when I wasn't in the mindset to pay close attention to a narrative. In that sense, it perfectly served its purpose.

[Sherri · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'll admit. David's humor isn't for everyone. He can be wildly inappropriate so if you're easily offended, I wouldn't recommend his books.

But in my opinion, there is no one wittier or a keener observer of our strange human behavior than him. He's one of those few authors whose books I will immediately buy (and typically in every format- physical because of his infamous book signings, audio because I like to imagine he's one of my dearest friends on the phone from far away, telling me about something strange and hilarious that happened, and often ebook so I don't mess up those treasured signed copies, of which I own at least eight. I'm kind of a big fan you could say).

David always narrates his audiobooks, but in this one, Tracey Ullman narrated the segments based in England and that was a fun surprise.

[Stacy Wittenberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 enthusiastic stars... no one out there does a witty, general musing like David Sedaris. And there is no one better on audio... his delivery is perfect every time. Tracey Ullman also narrated some entries and was excellent. I will honestly keep this queued up on my audio and probably open it to random places just to prolong my delight with this collection. If you already love David Sedaris, this will further endear him to you. If you've never read his work- why not?!

[Karen Ng · Rating 2 out of 5]

I started this book just to prove that I'm over David Sedaris, especially his old stories. I am.