Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls by David Sedaris

Title: Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls

Author: David Sedaris

Publisher: Little, Brown and Company 2013

Genre: Nonfiction

Pages: 275

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Popsugar - Recommended by a family member; 52 Books - W48

A guy walks into a bar car and...

From here the story could take many turns. When this guy is David Sedaris, the possibilities are endless, but the result is always the same: he will both delight you with twists of humor and intelligence and leave you deeply moved.

Sedaris remembers his father's dinnertime attire (shirtsleeves and underpants), his first colonoscopy (remarkably pleasant), and the time he considered buying the skeleton of a murdered Pygmy.

Hmmm... So I really enjoyed Sedaris's other books, but this one fell a bit flat for me. The essays felt a bit tired of overdone. I couldn't really connect with his stories. I was very distracted while reading this one. I couldn't seem to focus.

Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk by David Sedaris

Title: Squireel Seeks Chipmunk

Author: David Sedaris

Illustrated by: Ian Falconer

Publisher: Little, Brown and Company 2010

Genre: Humor

Pages: 159

Rating:   5 / 5 stars

Reading Challenges: Amazon -- Customer Favorites

Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk: A Modest Bestiary is a collection of animal-themed humorous short stories by memoirist and humorist David Sedaris.

If animals were more like us, if mice kept pets and toads could cuss, if dogs had wives and chipmunks dated, sheep sat still and meditated, then in the forest, field, and dairy you might find this bestiary, read by storks, by rats and kitties, skimmed by cows with milk-stained titties. "I found the book to be most droll," might quip the bear, the owl, the mole.  Others, though would be more coarse.  "Bull," could say the pig and horse.  As to the scribe, they'd quote the hen: "Trust me, he's no La Fontaine."

Delightful collection of stories.  Some funny, some sad, some thought provoking.  Make not mistake about it, these stories really aren't about animals. Unless you consider humans just to be another species of animals.  Then, yes, it is about animals of the upright two-legged kind.

My favorites:

• The Parenting Storks -- What happens when we try to answer the touch questions?  What kinds of answers do we get?  One stork thinks she has it all figures out.  Unfortunately for her and her child, her answers aren't real or logical.  Poor stork!
• The Crow and the Lamb -- The cruel things we do to each other.  Makes for a great story about a lost sheep and lamb and the selfish crow.
• The Judicious Brown Chicken -- Pride goeth before a fall.  Haven't I read that somewhere?  Another take on the phrase.

David Sedaris has certainly hit another home run.  Just amazing!