Holidays on Ice Review
I really liked the Macy's Elf portion of the narrative but the remaining tracks left something to be desired.
Holidays on Ice Overview
In Holidays on Ice, Sedaris skewers the absurd conventions and contrivances of the holiday season with hilarious effect. Listener-favorite "SantaLand Diaries" joins new material in a bevy of holiday cheer that sparkles with imagination. Special guest Ann Magnuson performs "Merry Christmas to Our Friends and Family," and Amy Sedaris peppers the stories with tidbits of comical characters throughout.
Holidays on Ice Specifications
Holidays on Ice is a collection of three previously published stories matched with three newer ones, all, of course, on a Christmas theme. David Sedaris's darkly playful humor is another common thread through the book, worming its way through "Seasons Greetings to Our Friends and Family!!!" a chipper suburban Christmas letter that spirals dizzily out of control, and "Front Row Center with Thaddeus Bristol," a vicious theatrical review of children's Christmas pageants. As always, Sedaris's best work is his sharply observed nonfiction, notably in "Dinah, the Christmas Whore," the tale of a memorable Christmas during which the young Sedaris learns to see his family in a new light. Worth the price of the book alone is the hilarious "SantaLand Diaries," Sedaris's chronicle of his time working as an elf at Macy's, covering everything from the preliminary group lectures ("You are not a dancer. If you were a real dancer you wouldn't be here. You're an elf and you're going to wear panties like an elf.") to the perils of inter-elf flirtation. Along the way, he paints a funny and sad portrait of the way the countless parents who pass through SantaLand are too busy creating an Experience to really pay attention to their children. In a sly way, it carries a holiday message all its own. Read it aloud to the adults after the kids have gone to bed. --Ali Davis
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Customer Reviews
Blah.... - Bobby T - South Riding, VA
Holidays on Ice was really a slight waste of time for me. Again, Sedaris set the bar SO high with his previous publications that anything else will simply not do. I forced myself to finish this and did so with barely a chuckle. I'll always have a soft spot in my heart for Mr. Sedaris, but his missed the mark on this one. But just a wee bit. If you're a Sedaris fan, by all means, read this book. Just don't expect too much.
Holidays on Ice - K.Thompson -
I love David Sedaris, but honestly this particular compilation of short stories was beyond dark.
(1) "SantaLand Diaries." By far the funniest of the bunch. This is an extremely comical recollection of time spent working as a Macy's Santa elf. The essay has a rather abrupt ending, but it'll make you laugh out loud.
(2) "Season's Greetings to Our Friends and Family!!!!" Here the collection already starts to take a toll for the morbid and frightening. Written in a holiday-letter form by a desperate, murderous housewife this story stretches the limits of dark humor to places that are just wrong. Infanticide + attempt at humor = bad, not funny.
(3) Dinah, the Christmas Whore. Sedaris almost redeemed himself. Almost. The story was okay. It wasn't a laugh-out-loud tale like "SantaLand," but it was decent.
(4) "Front Row Center." At least it's short. In this short story, a "reporter" gives reviews for all the Christmas-themed school pageants. Kinda creepy that someone would go to all of them, and there's only so much kid-acting-bashing one can take. Guess that's why it was short
(5) "Based Upon a True Story." This was absolutely criminal. A TV producer pays the local town preacher off in order to give one of the most insulting, degrading, soul-less "sermons" in history.
(6) "Christmas Means Giving." This one had potential. Sedaris at least was creative in his exaggerations. However, it did seem once again to go a little over the line.
These essays had potential. The biggest problem was that Sedaris frequently confused sarcasm with humor. It won't exactly put you in the Christmas spirit, but if you like Sedaris, you'll probably still manage to find ways to like the book.
Great for a long drive! - V. Kruggel - Pensacola, FL
I have listened to this again and again on long road trips...it makes me laugh out loud every time.
Disturbing, loses connection to the insanity that is Xmas for most of us - MLINUS - New Hampshire, USA
His previous books were laugh-out-loud funny; I once had to stop my car because I was laughing too hard when listening to one of his books on tape. But this one was sad and disturbing. I struggled to keep reading after the woman killed her grandbaby in a clothes dryer, in an attempt to frame her husband's newly discovered adult illegitimate Vietnamese daughter (yes, that classic Xmas story). There were funny moments in the department store elf piece, although even that just sounded angry by the end.
Gifted humorists make us laugh at our own shortcomings, but they do this from our side of the line. It feels like Sedaris has crossed the line, really rather hates most people, and believes he can only top previous writing by developing more outrageous and darker plots -- ones that I can't relate to at all. It's a shame because there's a wealth of information to be mined from day to day 'normal' human interactions around the holiday season.
*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Sep 04, 2010 08:45:06
