Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris

Overall- A: Sedaris' true stories of growing up with his crazy family in Raleigh, NC is one not to miss!

There are so many things to love about Me Talk Pretty One Day: the honesty in the stories, the simplicity in the writing, and the realistic characters that are so extraordinary they seem fictional. Above all else, though, I loved that this non-fictional collection stemmed away from the typical memoir: Sedaris doesn't start off by saying, "I was born on a cold November night," instead, he starts with, "In 5th grade, I had a sadistic speech therapist," which immediately made me wonder what happened to him in a previous life to make that his fortune.

Let’s start with the first story, Go Carolina.  5^th grader David Therarith had a lisp (Clever, huh?) and speech therapist Miss Chrissy Samson (It’s oddly appropriate, if you think about it) had been put in charge of helping David with his speech impediment.  There’s a problem though…she took more pleasure in making him and other boys self-conscious of their speech impediments than she did actually helping them.  So, to avoid the bullying, David expanded his vocabulary so he didn’t have to say anything with an ‘s’ sound in it. Example: Yes became correct, please became with your kind permission, and forget about plurals.   When Miss Samson noticed this, she began to play games, trying to trip him up.  Eventually, she gets him to say “I’m thorry,” which ruins everything. And his mother? How does she take this ‘harassment?’ She says, “You’ve got to admit that you really are a sucker.”  Nice mom, huh?

His childhood wasn’t the only one in his family who seemed to have unrealistic moments… all of his siblings did, especially his sister, Amy. In the short story, Shiner like a Diamond, David explains how Amy liked to impersonate others by dressing up in costume, wearing prosthetics, makeup, etc. and she did all of this simply out of amusement.   In contrast to her free-spirited lifestyle, their father was so insecure about his daughter's appearances (especially Amy's) that his "concerns" bordered on verbal abuse, saying things like, "Look at you, you’re the size of a house. Two more pounds and you won’t be able to cross state lines without a trucking license.” Admirably, Amy never took his comments to heart (unlike her sisters who, understandably, cried when told such horrible things). In fact, (out of humor, not malice) she played a practical joke on him by wearing a fat suit for the week she came home to visit; his veins popping with how upset he was over her ‘weight gain.’ On her last day, she took the fat suit off and let him breathe again.   Amy's qualities match those of endless heroines and characters in fictitious stories I’ve read over the years but reading of a real-life ordinary woman, like herself, who fearlessly rides above society's expectations, serves to be an inspiration to us all.

After reading several of these stories, I really thought these stories were fictional with his family members as characters because of how crazy these scenarios were.  As I ventured on, however, I realized they border the line between fiction and nonfiction with the stories being so crazy and ridiculous that they have to be true, even if we don't believe it.

All in all, Sedaris’ stories were honest and addicting.  He managed to show that inside everyone lies the peculiar idiosyncrasies that makes each of us individuals. Growing up is tough, but figuring out who we are as individuals is even tougher, so don’t focus on the big picture; focus on the moments that will eventually create the big picture.

~Shelly-Beans