Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim

by David Sedaris
Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim  
published 2004 by Little Brown & Co.
binding Paperback
isbn 0965904830   (isbn13: 9780965904834)
date added
12-14-06



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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 23516)



David
David rated it: 2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars2 of 5 stars
07/15/07

So. David Sedaris.
Well, let's be clear. Nobody with a funnybone can hate David Sedaris. And neither do I. But it has to be said - that last book ("Dress your family in corduroy and denim") was quite a disappointment. Judging by the number of people showing up for his readings here in San Francisco, and its lengthy sojourn on The New York Times bestseller list, it obviously did pretty well commercially. And, based on the enormous amount of accumulated goodwill from his earlier books,...more
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Chris
01/02/08

Read in January, 2007
recommends it for: baby jesus
What the hell is up with these self-proclaimed comedic homosexuals foisting their less-than-spectacular and pointlessly bland recollections of their ‘exceptionally misunderstood lives’ upon the masses; and what more, what the hell is the majority of the public embracing this bullshit for?! It's ok to be an outacst, it's okay to be one of the minority that has been encumbered with undue obstacles since day one and grown into a stronger person for it....so i've heard. And David Sedaris (pres...more
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  3 comments

Michael
Michael rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
07/26/08

Read in November, 2005
Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim delves further into the fascinating, hilarious, and otherwise utterly bizarre life of David Sedaris and his family. This collection of his essays is quite good--among my favorites of his--because throughout most of it, he manages to find a moving balance between the tragic and the comic.

Take, for instance, "The Ship Shape," about how his family almost bought a summer home, but ultimately lost out on the chance because of his father's ...more
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Alicia
Alicia rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
07/19/08

bookshelves: essays, light-reads, memoir
The world could use more books like this, especially if they are to be written by David Sedaris. Nothing is as refreshing as literature that manages to be both entertaining and thoughtful without making undue demands on the reader. Dress Your Family is as clean and refreshing as lemonade on a porch in summertime.

At least, as far as prose style is concerned.

Because, let's face it, nobody can provoke absurdity like David Sedaris, even when that absurdity leads to sober reflection.

Examp...more
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Aaron
06/23/08

bookshelves: currently-reading, memoir
Read in June, 2008
Having known little about David Sedaris before embarking upon this collection of essays, I sense that I approached them with some advantage over his avid readers. Getting a sense of his writing through these personal memoirs is almost like discovering him for myself, though I can now speak highly of him to others without actually having to have gone through the trouble of reading any of his other works. Of course, this is now my prerogative, and I suspect that before I die I will pick up "M...more
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Lauren
Lauren rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
09/26/07

Read in September, 2007
recommends it for: people who like humor
I love David Sedaris. I'm actually really glad that I'm reading his works somewhat sequentially. I read Naked first and then this. And yes, I will have to read Me Talk Pretty One Day out of order.

Naked is really about growing up. It's told almost in order of events that happened in his life. Dress Your Family is more about when he's older, and I think the stories are a little less funny and exaggerated, and more poignant. I'd probably have to read it again to say...more
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Shelly
Shelly rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
03/22/08

bookshelves: listened-to-on-ipod
The only thing more entertaining than reading one of David Sedaris's (sp;i've always had a hard time with the possessive apostrophe on 's' ending words)books is listening to one. I'm so picky about books on tape/cd/mp3/whatever. But Sedaris is great.
After the whole James Frey controversy I was doing some 'googling' and found some articles where folks were questioning Sedaris's authenticity too. This was sort of reassuring to me because I'm so jealous of his work. Not only is Sedaris full o...more
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Sarah
Sarah rated it: 5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars
07/26/07

bookshelves: post-college-greats
Read in January, 2005
This book makes me laugh myself sick every time I read it. Blood Work and La Nuit of the Dead are put together so perfectly. Sedaris creates a series of misguided attempts at human connection that seem doomed to fail through selfishness or insecurity, but somehow don’t. Sedaris is so good at exposing the frailty of those emotional connections without ever doubting that they can still sustain our relationships. He makes me relate to even the most impossibly awkward and painful situations. Every...more
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Allyson
bookshelves: personalessays
Read in May, 2007
When I grow up I want to write like David Sedaris.

People have repeatedly told me that "Me Talk Pretty One Day" is Sedaris' best work and that his other books are mediocre in comparison, but this was the first complete book of his that I have read and I am simply enchanted; he is a remarkable storyteller. That said, I would state that the first few essays and the last are his strongest and somewhere in the middle things get a bit messier: his writing is not as tight and a couple of...more
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Bryan
Bryan rated it: 3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars
10/07/07

bookshelves: 2007, own
Read in September, 2007
Here are some of my favorite quotes from the book:

"Usually when I was forced to compete, it was my tactic to simply give up. To try in any way was to announce your ambition, which only made you more vulnerable. The person who wanted to win but failed was a loser, while the person who didn't really care was just a weirdo -- a title I had learned to live with."

--from the story, Full House


"I can't seem to fathom that the things important to me are not importan...more
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amanda
amanda rated it: 5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars
10/23/07

bookshelves: 50booksin07
Read in October, 2007
Oh, David Sedaris, what would I do without you?

While I didn't find this book to be as funny as Me Talk Pretty One Day, I found it to be more enjoyable to read. There was more sentimentality there, even while making fun of his siblings. He has this amazing ability to blur the line between fact and exaggeration as you go through many of his interesting days from childhood to adulthood. His father dragging him to the house of the most popular boy in school and demanding that his parents pay fo...more
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empirerecords
empirerecords rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
12/21/07

bookshelves: read-and-reviewed
Read in December, 2007
Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim is a hilarious book about David Sedaris's life and family. It starts off when he was a young boy and he has to give up his Halloween candy to the neighbors. He then stuffed as much candy in his face as possible so he wouldn't have to share it. I knew right after this chapter that I was going to like this book. As you read further in the book you learn all about his family like his brother, Paul, the rooster. Different events occur in this book that tell yo...more
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Jennifer
Jennifer rated it: 5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars
08/28/07

Read in August, 2007
recommends it for: anyone needing a laugh
oh so hilarious...

"What the hell are you doing?" she whispered, but my mouth was too full to answer...as she closed the door and behind her and moved toward my bed, I began breaking the wax lips and candy necklaces pulled from pile no. 2. These were the second-best things I had received, and while it hurt to destroy them, it would have hurt evern more to give them away. I had just started to mutilate a miniature box of Red Hots when my mother pried them from my hands, ac...more
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Alex
Alex rated it: 5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars
10/19/07

Read in January, 2004
recommends it for: anyone who has read david sedaris
This is probably my favorite David Sedaris book overall. It's not the funniest, but that's not why I like it. I don't think I even read the "funny" essays in this book anymore. But I read pretty much all of the other ones obsessivly. "Repeat After Me" might be my favorite thing that he's written, although I could be wrong. He's written a lot of neat things. The other stories I go to right away are "Put a Lid on It" and "The Girl Next Door".

Arguably, t...more
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Daniel
11/28/07

bookshelves: biography, have-read, non-fiction
Read in November, 2005
David Sedaris seemed like a "big name" in essayist. I was running across him everywhere, I thought. Then, at a friend's house, I picked up one of his earlier collections and chuckled through a few of the essays. And so it was that I was looking forward to this collection.

However, what I came away with was a personal dislike for David Sedaris himself. What I came away with was a vision of a gay man (please note that I don't care one bit if he's gay or not, but HE sure seemed to play...more
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kimberly
kimberly rated it: 5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars5 of 5 stars
03/11/08

bookshelves: memoir, own
Has a copy to sell/swap — Read in March, 2008
recommended to kimberly by: rachael estrada
recommends it for: anyone with a dysfunctional family.
I don't think I can even list all my favorite moments of this book - but two stand out the most, merely because of timing. one, his description of his brother's baby. i had the same reaction at the hospital on friday while meeting Grace Trinity Faith Jones (i don't think even that many religious names will save this child). two, his description of the need to touch people, not inappropriately but unwelcome, relates to a long drawn out discussion with my judge regarding sexually battery and mole...more
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Kerry
10/21/07

Read in January, 2006
Yeah, at this point, David Sedaris knows his audience and knows what they want to hear: funny stories about the Sedaris clan. Gone is the weird ghoulishness that hampered "Holidays On Ice," and the wacky familial mishaps that made "Me Talk Pretty One Day" so enjoyable are back in full force. It's possibly too much of a good thing: we know what to expect, and can practically write our own "David Sedaris essay" at this point (here, I'll start: "When I was young...more
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Punk
Punk rated it: 3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars3 of 5 stars
08/28/07

bookshelves: non-fiction, queer
Read in February, 2005
Non-fiction. Essays from everyone's favorite neurotic gay humorist. This book feels sort of random, with no real overarching theme. The stories jump around in time and don't give much context, but it's David Sedaris and it's funny and he talks about his brother the Rooster, along with a couple other siblings I didn't even realize he had.

[TANGENT: I'd actually heard a few of these from an audiobook, so I already knew their punchlines. I could hear Sedaris' voice in my head while I was readin...more
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Zanny
08/25/07

Read in October, 2006
recommends it for: Anybody
I hope the bulk of us are already convinced that David Sedaris has a pretty solid sense of humor. O what a clever man. There were several very excellent essays in this book, my favorite being "Six to Eight Black Men," about the Christmas traditions of the Dutch.
On the other hand, there are predictably more than a few rather offensive essays that could probably stand to be skipped by the sensitive. Not that I plan to ward anyone off about anything specifically...so good luck.
Fo...more
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Eleni
Eleni rated it: 4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars4 of 5 stars
06/26/08

bookshelves: currently-reading
Read in June, 2008
Having a new book out this year, Sedaris' name has been everywhere lately - I came across it in The New York Times and Newsweek. When I got back from London, I picked up this book at the library to see what all the fuss was about. I have liked his sister - Amy Sedaris - especially her quirky sense of humour in __Stranger with Candy_ and thought that perhaps they shared an off-beat humour. Half way through this book, I am enjoying it and can't wait to pick up another one of his books - probabl...more
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book data (includes all editions)

avg rating (all editions): 3.96 (20760 ratings)
avg rating (this edition): 3.97 (15822 ratings)
number of reviews: 1653