Hard to believe, but Happy-Go-Lucky is my sixth book by David Sedaris. I've listened to all of them on audiobook and I just love his sing song rhythm of reflection and storytelling. After a while, I find myself yearning to hear more of his stories and this time - thankfully - I wasn't disappointed.

I've acknowledged in previous reviews that David's white privilege is on full display but it doesn't get under my skin in the same way it does - or has - for other readers. We already know he's white and wealthy and gay, so taking offence with his privilege isn't quite fair. What other lived experience can he offer?

My key takeaway from listening to Happy-Go-Lucky was a chapter called A Speech to the Graduates which comprised a commencement address Sedaris gave to graduates at Oberlin College. Recorded in 2018, you can watch it online for free. I found the speech so entertaining I listened to it twice and asked my husband to listen to it with me. If asked to choose between Make Good Art by Neil Gaiman (a renowned speech to graduates if there ever was one) and this one, I'd be hard pressed to choose between them. They're completely dissimilar in style, but what they share in common is an ability to inspire young listeners to take risks, make mistakes and make the most of life.

The chapter entitled Active Shooter documents the author's experience going to a firing range for the first time with his sister Lisa.

"This was a niche market I knew nothing about until I returned to Lisa's house later that day and went online. There I found websites selling gun concealment vests, t-shirts, jackets you name it. One company makes boxer briefs with a holster in the back which they call compression concealment shorts, but which I would call gunderpants." Chapter: Active Shooter

As he mentions in his speech to the graduates, Sedaris recommends the practice of having a few jokes up your sleeve at any given time. In a chapter entitled Themes and Variations, the author proceeds to tell some of the best jokes he's heard from fans on book signing tours which had me laughing out loud and often. The two most memorable included a snail's reaction and two priests in a car, while the anecdote offered regarding two rolling pins and falling down the stairs had me laughing so hard I was red-faced with tears streaming down my face.

Sedaris always manages to deliver both light and dark and in Happy-Go-Lucky he bravely discloses his father's declining health, surprising personality changes and eventual death:

"... our natures, I have just recently learned from my father, can change. Or maybe they're simply revealed, and the dear cheerful man I saw that afternoon at Springmore was there all along, smothered in layers of rage and impatience that burned away as he blazed into the home stretch." Chapter: Happy-Go-Lucky

Sedaris has previously written about living in France and learning the language, and in this offering published in 2022, he remembers what it was like during his first few visits, smiling and pretending to know what was going on.

"It was so humbling being robbed of my personality like that. I was never the smartest guy in the room but I could usually hold my own. In Normandy though, I was considered an idiot. Worse still, I couldn't get a laugh to save my life. In America, that was my thing, my identity." Chapter: Bruised

Books that can make me laugh until I cry usually earn an automatic 5 stars from me, but two chapters bothered me a little. The first was about a young male and the second was a chapter entitled Lady Marmalade where the author shared a controversial view about his sister Tiffany's accusations of abuse by their father. While these views were shared by other family members, it's not a topic I was comfortable hearing about or thought was appropriate to share with the public. Nevertheless, I'm not surprised Sedaris chose to work through these questions in the way he knows best, writing. ( )

It is not explained where David Sedaris found the cover picture for his latest book: a black and white photo of a very creepy clown holding an old fashioned poodle and entertaining a little girl in a sixties era haircut and outfit. I imagine one of his sisters (Lisa, Gretchen, or the famous Amy) finding it in a flea market post card bin and snapping it up for him. I feel like I know everyone in the Sedaris family personally because I have been reading his autobiographical (personal? confessional? revelatory? anecdotal?) essays for thirty years. That they grew up in the sixties and seventies, as did I with my seven siblings and their family went through the same things (alcoholism, addiction, mental illness) may be why I identify so strongly with them. But it's the fact that he tells these stories with such hilarity and heart that makes him seem like the most popular cousin at the family reunion. The one who brought the pot. ( )

Even a bitter Sedaris is still funny
Review of the Little, Brown & Company audiobook edition (May 31, 2022) narrated by the author, released simultaneously with the Little, Brown & Company hardcover original.

The terrible shame about the pandemic in the United States is that more than 800,000 people have died to date, and I didn’t get to choose a one of them.

Happy-Go-Lucky consists of 18 recent David Sedaris monologues/mini-memoir-essays, some of them recorded in live performances. Themes and Variations (2020) appeared earlier as an Amazon Original Story which I reviewed as Funny as Ever.

Several of the essays relate to the COVID lockdown era and overall there seemed to be a more bitter and curmudgeonly tone to many of them. Topics included COVID, American gun culture, mortality and death esp. the passing of Sedaris' own father etc. So there were some rather grim areas where the humour is darker than usual.

Where I live now, in the UK, it’s hard to get a rifle and next to impossible to secure a handgun. Yet somehow, against all odds, British people feel free. Is it that they don’t know what they’re missing? Or is the freedom they feel the freedom of not being shot to death in a classroom or shopping mall or movie theater?

In any case, I've been a long-term Sedaris fan and am ready to keep following him down the darker roads as well.

Soundtrack
You Want it Darker by Leonard Cohen. ( )

I almost feel like David Sedaris is a family member. In the past few years I have listened to his books exclusively on audio book and when I am in the middle of one it is always such a wonderful thing to look forward to hours of David entertaining me while I cook or drive. I really enjoyed this collection. His ruminations on his aging and dying father were particularly poignant to me. His fearless conversations about his family and the dynamics and difficulties they have had have been reassuring and instructive to me. I am always looking forward to his next book. ( )

Sedaris truly captures being holed up in Manhattan during the pandemic, as well as his anxious return to the stage and the road he has always loved. But things have changed: he travels through a now troubled post(ish) Covid America. As a cultural snapshot of where we are in the pandemic, Sedaris is, as always, spot on in his observations. They are rather a icky - sick making - reflection of the current soul of America.

Finally, with my apologies for getting hyper-pop psychology here: Over the years Sedaris has shared his father, Lou with us. Along with the disturbing aspects of Lou’s personality, Sedaris has also showed us how fully committed he has been in fulfilling his family obligations for his dad. There has always been a challenging form of love there. In Happy Go Lucky, Sedaris is surprisingly honest and, yes, bitter in his final goodbye to his father, Lou. His end of life thoughts on his life-long troubles with his dad are very very sad - and I’m sure relatable by many. All in all I feel that Sedaris certainly must know and appreciate that he is truly loved and accepted by his surviving family, his many friends, and his many many fans, but Lou’s rejection is a wound that seems to continue to mar his enjoyment of all the love and admiration in his life. Just a thought, maybe Sedaris really is Happy Go Lucky. ( )