A Carnival of Snackery

This is the second volume of David Sedaris's published diaries, following Theft by Finding, which covered 1977 to 2002. Spanning 2003 to 2020, the book draws from decades of daily writing. In an introduction, Sedaris explains his editorial choices: He cut hundreds of mentions of mice, exhaustive reports on litter he picked up in the UK, and entries that struck him as too self-conscious. What remains are entries he found funny or startling, with no clear narrative arc. He concedes he could "easily look much, much worse" than he does in these pages and acknowledges his preference for the personal and absurd over the political.

The early years, 2003 and 2004, establish patterns that recur throughout. Sedaris split his time between apartments in London and Paris, a farmhouse called La Bagotière in Normandy, and relentless book tours across the United States. He and his partner, Hugh, navigated rising Franco-American tensions during the Iraq War, as French friends began directing criticism at Americans in general rather than at their government alone. Sedaris documents absurdities of post-9/11 airport security, including a British award whose first prize went to an airport that forced a woman to drink from three bottles of her own breast milk. A media escort in Pittsburgh named Susie delivered a rapid-fire monologue about the Big Mac's local origins and her theory that Democratic women lack "vaginal tenacity."

Alongside the comedy, Sedaris records his sister Tiffany's escalating crises. Tiffany needed money for rent, a foot operation, and dental work. She claimed someone broke into her apartment and stole painkillers while doing her dishes. She prided herself on her poverty and gave away money she could not afford to lose. Sedaris also tracks the decline of his literary agent, Don Congdon, who gradually lost his vocabulary. By 2004, Congdon had forgotten the word "page." By 2006, he had lost "rain," "week," and "day," though he maintained an authoritative cadence in sentences that no longer made sense. Congdon died in November 2009 at 91, and Sedaris remembers him as "the last of the New York gentlemen."

Through the mid-2000s, Sedaris deepened his engagement with community life in London, volunteering with Age Concern, a charitable organization for the elderly. His interview with the coordinator went awry when he asked if any clients were expected to die before his departure date. At a Harvard Book Store reading, a trained capuchin monkey from Helping Hands, which trains monkeys to assist people with paralysis, stole focus and inspired Sedaris to donate $2,000. In January 2007, Sedaris and Hugh spent three months in Tokyo, where Sedaris quit smoking.

By 2009 and 2010, the book's recurring concerns sharpen. Sedaris discovered a lump beneath his rib cage and panicked about cancer; a Paris doctor diagnosed it as a lipoma, a benign fatty deposit. He had lunch with the comedian Phyllis Diller, then 91, at the Bel-Air hotel. Diller told jokes, declared herself an atheist, and instructed Sedaris to call her. By May 2012, a stroke had left her markedly diminished, though she still delivered her trademark laugh.

The purchase of Swan Cottage in the village of Rackham, West Sussex, marked a turning point. Hugh saw potential in a filthy property; Sedaris saw only junk. The house became his base for an all-consuming hobby: picking up litter along the roads of West Sussex. He bonded with Andrew Baldwin, a local councillor, over their shared obsession and their disgust at dog-waste bags hung from tree branches. Eventually, the Horsham district council named a garbage truck after Sedaris at a small champagne ceremony.

The book's central family tragedy arrived on May 30, 2013, when Sedaris learned of Tiffany's death while connecting through the Dallas airport. After confirming the news with his sister Lisa by phone, he proceeded directly to a Barnes and Noble in Baton Rouge and signed books for six hours without anyone suspecting. He recalled Tiffany joining him at a signing years earlier, distributing cards that read "TIFFANY SEDARIS, DAVID'S LOSER SISTER. MOSAIC ARTIST." His sister Amy captured the family's disbelief in an email: "I can't wrap my head around Tiffany being dead." Sedaris later researched hypomania after learning Tiffany had identified with the condition, finding the symptom list matched her precisely. On Thanksgiving 2013, the family scattered their mother's ashes on the beach at Emerald Isle, North Carolina, using shells as scoops, and reflected on their parents' marriage 22 years after her passing.

Political currents run through the book with increasing force. Sedaris records a 2012 confrontation with his father over North Carolina's Amendment 1, which banned gay marriage and civil unions. Dad said he voted for it because "it sends the wrong message." By 2016, the stakes had escalated. Sedaris watched Trump's candidacy with disbelief. After the Brexit vote in June, he observed that in London "it's like someone died." At Thanksgiving, a heated argument erupted when Dad insisted "Donald Trump is not an asshole" and called him "the best thing that's happened to this country in a long time." Sedaris and his siblings cited the Access Hollywood tape, Breitbart News executive Steve Bannon, and Trump's lack of political experience, but Dad refused to budge.

Sedaris also developed an intense attachment to a fox he named Carol, who visited the Sussex garden nightly. He fed her frankfurters and chicken, sitting on the steps outside his office to commune with her, while Hugh warned that the feeding would make Carol dependent.

In December 2018, Sedaris underwent a prostate exam and cystoscopy after experiencing blood in his urine. The urologist found his prostate felt "harder than it should be," triggering weeks of anxiety before scans showed nothing concerning. In 2019, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, an honor he found almost incomprehensible given his origins. That same year, he visited his father at Springmoor, an assisted-living facility in Raleigh. Dad whispered, repeated questions every few minutes, and drank soup through a straw. He called Sedaris "my buddy," a word Sedaris found startlingly wrong for their relationship. Amy later reported that Dad had seen his dead parents outside his window: "My father was smiling, so at first I didn't recognize him. He never smiled."

The final year, 2020, brings the COVID-19 pandemic. Sedaris documents the virus's arrival in New York: refrigerated trucks for bodies, a tent hospital in Central Park, constant sirens. He watched the killing of George Floyd on video and joined protests in Manhattan with Amy, reflecting on his discomfort in the role of ally. He voted in North Carolina, passing a lonely Democratic volunteer who said, "I just sit here all day and listen to lies." When the Associated Press called Pennsylvania for Biden on November 7, Sedaris experienced an unexpected surge of emotion, ran to tell Hugh, and the two embraced before heading out to celebrate. Dad, now 97, tested positive for COVID but survived without hospitalization.

The book closes on New Year's Eve at Emerald Isle. Sedaris reflects that 2020 stripped away the touring, the audiences, and the airline status that sustained his identity, leaving him to confront who he is without applause. A handyman tells him about a squirrel that stole someone's Christmas lights simply because it wanted them, and "there's not a goddamn thing you can do about it."