Peachy Reads

Funny man David Sedaris tries something new with this collection of tales populated by a cast of trailer-trash animals. Ian Falconer (of Olivia fame to children's librarians) provides the whimsical illustrations for these cautionary tales inspired by Aesop. I heard David Sedaris present a couple selections from this collection at a recent performance and I think it works better as a readaloud (preferably in his voice), or maybe try the audio version read by him and some other celebrities. The tales were just so dark (it is a dog-eat-dog world in the animal kingdom after all)-- a couple stories featuring animals getting their eyes pecked out, others getting brained, and snakes swallowing mice as cute as Stuart Little. The subtitle of the British edition is "a wicked bestiary," which I think is a more accurate reflection of the content. I was waiting for big laughs, and while Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk was clever and amusing, the belly laughs that usually accompany Sedari...

I saw the documentary film of this project on Netflix Instantview the other day and was fascinated by it, so I downloaded the book No Imapact Man to my Nook (thus saving paper, but not electricity-- which is better?). Beavan tries to pull a Thoreau and get back to basics-- not in a remote woodland cabin, but in the middle of energy-guzzling, trash mountain-producing Manhattan. During the course of the year his family shunned elevators, paper napkins, disposable cups (disposable anything, really) electricity, and any motor-driven transport. The goal was to make no environmental impact for an entire year. His effort wasn’t perfect, but it certainly was thought-provoking. His wife is the perfect foil to his gravitas, and makes his sermonizing tolerable in both the film and the book. In the end, each of us could benefit by implementing even a small portion of what Beavan suggests. No Impact Man offers much food for thought (though only of the vegetarian, organic, locavore variety)....