IMO: Raunchy, dark, not funny. Interesting writing style. 0/5

Warning: Spoiler Alerts (but I don’t recommend you read this book, so please continue!)

Yes, I am giving Holidays on Ice by David Sedaris 0 out of 5. Maybe that’s unfair since I only stomached a third of the book before putting it down for good. I just couldn’t find the humor in a ‘crack’ baby dying in a washing machine during the Hot Cycle. That was it for me. I’ve read novels where terribly tragic things happen. I’ve ready EXCELLENT novels where tragic things happen. But to write a humorous (allegedly) book and include that story line… nope. Done.

I found this cute little Christmas book at Barnes and Noble. It was the featured $5 book in their cafe. I LOVE their $5 cafe picks. They are reads I would not normally pick out for myself. The last one I bought was fantastic and impressive. I don’t always buy the book. I read the story summary on the back to make sure there’s an inkling of interest. The first review on the back of Holidays on Ice was by Liesl Schillinger from the New York Times, “Not remotely politically correct or heartwarming.” Another was from Newsday, “No one is funnier or more wistfully absurd than David Sedaris.”

Political correctness has usurped reality and I love humor. And for FIVE DOLLARS… how could I pass up this Christmas book?

Hmph

Holidays on Ice is a book of six short stories. The first is written in the style of diary entries by a grown-man working as an elf at SantaLand. Almost funny. He used the ‘R’ word, which made me uncomfortable, but I assumed he grew up back in the day when that word was appropriate, so I let it slide. I didn’t however laugh out loud once.

From the 64 pages I read, the best line was… ‘”I’m going to have you fired!” and I wanted to lean over and say, “I’m going to have you killed.”‘ (This was during a busy day of impatient guests to SantaLand.) Now that’s funny! I can get dark humor! But in the next story, the baby dies and I was out.

Sedaris took it too far. Maybe I should’ve known when I saw one of the short-stories is named, Dinah the Christmas Whore. I like funny. I like things that are not PC. This was just not my cup of tea. Very disappointing.

I would much rather read the Hallmark-esque, predictable, happy ending Christmas stories. ‘Tis the season.

Next week, I will be reviewing Finding Noel by Richard Paul Evans. At this point, I just hope it’s decent enough for me to finish because I’m nine books away from my Goodreads Reading Challenge goal and I only have 27 days to get there. I don’t have time to spend time reading crappy books only to not finish.

Cheers and Happy Christmas Reading!