The two best stories/essays in this book, the Holiday Newsletter one and the Department Store Elf one, are also in "Holidays on Ice," which I'd already read. The other essays occasionally surprised me with their graphic detail but I did enjoy the dark humor, somewhat twisted fantasies and hilariously brutal observations.
If you like David Sedaris, you should consider the audiobook versions of his books, read by Sedaris himself. That makes his stories and essays even better.

Why the last four stories in this collection are called essays I do not know. There is nothing essayistic in them.

A strange book. Nearly every story starts in a way that you expect a great one. And not one story keeps the promise. The first one manages at least to keep the excitement half way thru. “I was on ‘Oprah’ a while ago, talking about how I used to love too much.” How is that for a beginning? And then he rambles on about his relationships with Chuck Connors, Mike Tyson, and Charlton Heston. And about Bruce: “If she’s calling Bruce ‘the Boss’, I can tell you she knows absolutely nothing about his ‘private Sides’. Really funny. Only it is not really a story.

The most interesting case is the story Gen’s Homophobia Newsletter. Because the entire point is already contained in the title. Yes, it is funny to read a homophobia newsletter (including the begging to subscribe). But there is nothing in addition to it.

Sometimes he uses original phrases and he does make you giggle from time to time. It is not enough, really.

I enjoy Sedaris’s essays more than his fictional short stories, but this was still great. Santaland Diaries is re-readable ad infinitum.

you just can't read a David Sedaris without laughing out loud. always enjoyable.
I do like the essays half more than the first half though

He’s trying to tell us something but I have no idea what it is I think this is my least favorite sedaris so far

I like David Sedaris’s writing and have enjoyed seeing him live several times over the years, but this particular collection wasn’t for me (plus I’d already read a few of the stories as I am slowly going through my collection of his books). I like it best when he talks about himself and his family, honestly.

Kinda surprised GR rating isn’t higher. Loved all the way through and excited to read more by Sedaris. Super funny, witty, and, dare I say… sassy???!

Sedaris is one of the few authors belonging to my "can't read in public" category because I simply can't read anything he writes while in public without laughing so hard that I fall over and end up rolling on the floor. Comedians and their essay collections come and go, but Barrel Fever will always be my all-time favorite.

I loved Me Talk Pretty One Day, but Barrel Fever was painful. The audiobook is read by the author with a few vocal appearances from his sister, Amy Sedaris.... I guess I was just expecting more from them than a tangled mess of sub par short stories - all of which seem to feature the same narcissistic, celebrity obsessed, accident prone, substance abusing, deadbeat narrator who happens to be gay. It's like a terrible version of Curb Your Enthusiam...in which the narrator is plugged into ridiculous and awkward scenarios and the character developement stops somewhere between hopeless dejection and bitterness. Stay away. Run Away.

Find all of my reviews at: http://52bookminimum.blogspot.com/

This summer the bridge that makes my commute easy breezy and beautiful like a Cover Girl commercial is undergoing construction which has resulted in a Kelly that pretty much looks like this while trying to make her way into the city . . . . .

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I decided for my own mental health maybe I should try an audio book, and what better person to choose than my beloved David. What can I say?????

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Barrel Fever proved that I am most definitely an “essays” rather than a “stories” type of gal and earns a paltry 3 Stars due to that fact. However, mediocre Sedaris is still waaaaaaaay better than no Sedaris at all – and also better than the alternative . . . . .

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Happy commuting, everyone : )

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To all of the reviewers who put down this collection of short stories and essays, I say: Give the man a break! Of course this book is nothing like "Me Talk Pretty One Day"--it's Sedaris' first novel and has very little of his own memoirs inside the cover. Authors are allowed to grow and better themselves and change their style as the years pass, so let's all just take a moment to take this book for what it is: a first printing of short stories written by a man who later becomes a great speaker and autobiographer.

Now, with that being said: I quite enjoyed the fact that this was nothing like other Sedaris works that I've read. The stories are disturbing and irreverent and gritty and hilarious and sarcastic and campy and filthy. I read a review who negatively compared this novel to reading a John Waters film--to which I say is the perfect comparison. If you're not a fan of the pretty, filthy world that Waters has the upper hand on, you won't like the words written in these pages. If, on the other hand, you're like me and would willing lick the ground that Waters' walks upon, then you will find a kindred spirit in "Barrel Fever". While reading, I kept making parallels in my head between the stories and Waters' films. "My Manuscript" is reminiscent of "A Dirty Shame", and "Music for Lovers" has a twinge of "Serial Mom". "Barrel Fever" also seems follow the same vein of the writing style of later authors Augusten Burroughs and Chuck Palahniuk, with a little A.M Holmes thrown in for good measure. It's definitely not for the faint of heart. If you can't stomach a little anal sex and lynch mob talk, then I would stick with his more family-oriented brand of neurosis. But, if you want a read that will make you squirm and question your morals, then please pick this up.

This is an early publication of David Sedaris. The first section is a collection of short stories in the first person. If I had been smart enough to read the section title, I would have enjoyed the first couple of stories more (I spent way too much time trying to figure out how the biographical details of the narrators matched up with the Sedaris persona that I'd become so fond of). The stories all have a humorous side, but overall are rather dark (the narrators range from social misfits to shallow snobs to complete sociopaths; their uniting features are a sense of misunderstood entitlement and an all-too-believable cluelessness about how they come off to the rest of the world). The second and shorter section of the book includes several largely autobiographical essays by Sedaris, including "The Santaland Diaries" (which makes the collection worthwhile in itself).