This is a collection of five short stories revolving around lonliness, betrayal, love and hope. The collection is started off with an introduction by David Sedaris. The list of stories include:

Where the Door is Always Open and the Welcome Mat is Out by Patricia Highsmith
Bullet in the Brain by Tobias Wolff
Gryphon by Charles Baxter
In the Cemetery Where All Jolson is Buried by Amy Hempel
Cosmopolitan by Akhil Sharma

I especially liked Gryphon (read by David Sedaris) and Cosmopolitan (read by the author).

Sending this off to Katekintail as a RABCK. Enjoy!

Thank you so much! I love David Sedaris' stories and I was interested to hear his choices in this anthology because I have seen most of the authors featured (Wolff, Baxter, and Hempel) at the conference I help run every year for work, though I've never read any of their stories.

This audio book actually didn't leave my car from the time I picked it up at the PO until just now. I had to finish earreading the Uglies series and then I gave this a listen.

I wouldn't say that I was disappointed... it's just that every single one of them seemed to end far too soon. Maybe that's because I was earreading them in the car and just couldn't give them 100% of my attention, so I missed something that would have made that moment a good one to end at? I'm not sure. But I was definitely caught off guard when they ended. Perhaps they were too literary for me and I missed the points? I hope not, so I'll blame it on earreading them in the car :-)

Introduction by David Sedaris- loved it. He definitely made me laugh and desperately want to love these stories. If David Sedaris would defend these stories to his death, I was bound to adore them, right?

Where the Door is Always Open and the Welcome Mat is Out by Patricia Highsmith- I liked that the two characters just didn't *get* each other. The lengths the main character went to in order to look good and prepare for her sister's visit really drew me in and taught me a whole lot about her. And then when her sister didn't notice a single thing she had done to prepare and, instead, focused on all the things entirely out of her sister's control, I wanted to slap the woman! LOL But, similarly, the main character just didn't seem to hear a thing her sister said. Even though all the fussing and detailed cleaning annoyed me... it still endeared me to her. And so I was totally on her side at the end... even though she was perfectly clueless. Oh, and Cherry Jones' reading of it was amazingly entertaining. She really did a great job bringing the main character to life.

Bullet in the Brain by Tobias Wolff- wow. Extremely short but not only focused on what he did think about in the last seconds of his life but also what he didn't think about. That was really interesting... and heartbreaking as well.

Gryphon by Charles Baxter- definitely one of my favorites, though I suspect I wouldn't have been quite so in love with it if not for Sedaris' reading. He was able to really accentuate the amazing range of normal to absolutely crazy that this young child sees (and that we see through his eyes). It brought to mind a lot of crazy childhood imaginary things and how black & white things are for me now that I'm an adult. This entertained me as well :-)

In the Cemetery Where All Jolson is Buried by Amy Hempel- This was poignant but also very dark. The whole world and especially the people in it feel so alive, and it's both understandable and rather startling when the mother never wants to have anything to do with it/them ever again.

Cosmopolitan by Akhil Sharma- Loved this. I usually love it when authors read their own stories. Sometimes, it's a BAD idea. But when it works (as it does here) it's wonderful hearing the way sentences are read and different words stressed from the person who wrote those words. I really, really like Gopal (rather, I could sympathize with him and understand his situation). I love that we get his POV but it really takes outside forces (Cosmopolitan magazine, Mrs. Shaw-what was her first name again?, and his ex-wife/daughter/Indian American community) to let us really get a sense of what's in his mind and heart. WOW! I just Googled it and found that they made a film based on this story in 2003. Think I'll have to track that down.

Now I wish I had the longer print version so I could try some of the other stories. I do love the idea of trying out an author here and then devouring his/her whole body of work (I tend to get stuck on authors that way, and Sedaris' name is why I put this on my wish list to begin with)

Giving this to melydia, who I think will enjoy it.

Oh dear. I have no idea how long this has been in my possession. But I shall listen to it! I...just don't know when. Sometime after the Convention, to be sure. Thanks!

A friend gave me this, as we are both Sedaris fans. None of this is his work (save the introduction, which was on par with most of his better essays), but I decided to trust his judgment and try something new. As with most collections, the stories were of varying quality.

Where the Door is Always Open and the Welcome Mat is Out by Patricia Highsmith, read by Cherry Jones: Mildred is rushing around frantically to prepare for her sister Edith’s visit. The reader was great, but the story itself was pretty boring. Maybe it was because I just wasn’t all that interested in the characters, or maybe because all the minutia felt excessively detailed.

Bullet In the Brain by Tobias Wolff, read by Toby Wherry: A fascinating little vignette that stretches out an instant of time into a fully coherent narrative, and it ended at just the right spot too.

Gryphon by Charles Baxter, read by David Sedaris: A new substitute teacher with crazy ideas. Sedaris did an excellent job, which is kind of surprising since he tends to narrate in a sort of monotone, but somehow he managed to get across everything with subtle changes in pitch and inflection. Probably my favorite of the batch.

In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson Is Buried by Amy Hempel, read by Mary-Louise Parker: I’ll be perfectly honest here: I had a whole lot of trouble following this one. Maybe I was just distracted, but I have absolutely no idea what it was about.

Cosmopolitan written and read by Akhil Sharma: A somewhat strange tale about an older Indian man attempting to have an affair with his American neighbor. Sharma probably should not have read his own story, as his cadence tended toward the droning, but I still very much enjoyed the story, and the ending made me smile.

In all, not a bad collection. These are the sorts of stories we’d read in creative writing classes, which gave me weird flashbacks from time to time, but it was a nice break from the string of novels I’d been listening to lately.

Adding this to BigJohnLefty's First CD-Only AudioBookBox.

Chosen from BigJohnLefty's CD-only bookbox

An excellent collection, very well performed - Cherry Jones and David Sedaris were the best, IMHO. Both KateKintail and melydia have written such good Journal Entries I can't add much, but I'd still like to share my reactions.

My favorite story is the first one, by Patricia Highsmith, which fascinated me so much I've just requested a collection of her short stories from our library. This story has a lot of detail, as melydia notes, but I liked that because Highsmith uses it to build a portrait of Mildred as a determined, strong-willed person. It's a good instance of the writer's goal "Show, don't tell." The picture I got is of someone who's chosen to leave the narrow small-town world, but still craves the good opinion of the family she left behind. She doesn't quite succeed this time, but as the story closes she's already starting to plan how she can make the next time better. Is this a sign of her strength, or of her need for approval? Both the character and the story are extremely vivid, and I'm happy they're staying with me.

My second favorite was 'Gryphon.' As KateKintail says, this can generate a real flashback to our childhoods and how open we were to new possibilities. A special treat for me was the use of "fossick," a wonderful word which we don't see used often in US fiction. Not only was it perfect in context, but it added to the characterization of the substitute teacher and her impatience with conventional limits.

Placed in BigJohnLefty's Audio Book Box

This book made a short stop here at my house. It will continue on its journey.

This book almost make it full circle, as I am supposed to mail the audio book box to imawinn2 after my selection. Well, fortunately or unfortunately, it decides not to go home yet.

This is supposedly a collection of short stories of what David Sedaris deemed as the creme de la creme, but, maybe because listening to short stories while driving doesn't do them justice, I didn't particularly feel wowed by them. Especially the last story, I'm sorry, but the author/reader is so monotonous I had a hard time focusing.

The first story is nice, the author did a great job portraying the character, and I think we can all feel both her joy and anxiety about preparing for someone's visit. Gryphon is a cute story, but somehow it feels that it ends too soon and not quite completed.

This is now heading to Moody Blue who selected it from Booklady331's vbb.

As always, if it has the name David Sedaris on it, I'll give it a shot -- even if it isn't his work.

A worthwhile collection. I listened to most of them twice to be sure I didn't miss anything.

This audiobook was an original inhabitant of my NEW Little Free Library, which was a birthday gift from my mother. Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoy your books. Please come again!