How Did You Get This Number
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- ISBN13: 9781594487590
- Condition: New
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Product Description
A brand-new book of hilarious and insightful personal essays by the iconic, irresistible Sloane Crosley.
From the leader of the sensational bestseller I Was Told There’d Be Cake comes a new book of personal essays brimming with all the charm and wit that have earned Sloane Crosley widespread acclaim, award nominations, and an ever-growing cadre of loyal fans. In Cake readers were introduced to the foibles of Crosley’s life in New York City-permanently teetering between the glamour of Manhattan parties, the indignity of entry-level work, and the special joy of suburban nostalgia-and to a literary voice that mixed Dorothy Parker with David Sedaris and became something all its own.
Crosley still lives and works in New York City, but she’s no longer the newcomer for whom a trip beyond the Upper West Side is a huge adventure. She can pack up her sensibility and takes us with her to Paris, to Portugal (having selected it by spinning a globe and putting down her finger, and finally falling in with a group of Portuguese clowns), and even to Alaska, where the “bear bells” on her fellow bridesmaids’ ponytails seemed silly until a grizzly cub dramatically intrudes. Meanwhile, back in New York, where new apartments beckon and taxi rides go awry, her sense of the city has become more layered, her relationships with friends and family tree more intricate.
As permanently, Crosley’s voice is fueled by the perfect quip, bright and breezy optimism, flair for drama, and simple charm in the face of minor suffering or potential drudgery. But in How Did You Get This Number it has also become increasingly sophisticated, quicker and sharper to the point, more complex and lasting in the emotions it explores. And yet, Crosley remains the unfailingly hilarious young Everywoman, healthily equipped with intelligence and poise to fend off any potential mundanity in maturity.
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Imagine a book penned by a young woman living in New York City, effective in publishing and occasionally traveling through Europe. As she writes about foreign language and intoxication, clowns and childhood pets, her voice is sardonic and sharp, her tales fraught with city culture and adventures, her tone amusing and smart with a touch of ennui. And, finally, imagine that her essays are surprising and sometimes illuminating while managing to be free of any moralistic attitude. Sound appealing? If so, then check out Sloane Crosley’s second collection of essays, HOW DID YOU GET THIS NUMBER. If you are imagining a less polished and amusing but still honestly charming collection along the lines of David Sedaris, you may be on to something.
Crosley’s essays are topically far-ranging, but she is the star in each. First, she attempts to navigate Lisbon in a solo trip and ends up drinking with student clowns with whom she cannot really communicate. In “Lost in Space,” she clarifies her learning disability, a “severe temporal-spatial deficit” that prevents her from, rumor has it that, succeeding on standardized tests, being able to tell time, or going anywhere lacking getting lost. If you are tempted to Google this disability, don’t bother; there is small to nothing on the web about it, so you will just have to take Crosley’s word that she is constantly “disoriented.”
Of the nine essays, three deal with living in New York. While “It’s Permanently Home You Miss” is forgettable (an ode to the odors of taxi cabs that makes New York seem generally disgusting, Crosley seems generally intolerant and manages to insult the entire state of New Mexico as a “dead zone”), the additional two are far more appealing and thoughtful. “Take a Stab at It” is Crosley’s riff on the familiar trying-to-find-a-fantastic-apartment-in-New-York refrain. Living with a kleptomaniac and jealous of a acquaintances rent-free abode, she goes to see a loft in the infamous McGurk’s Suicide Hall, a building that once housed a depressing and violent brothel in the Bowery. Could it be haunted? she wonders. Wouldn’t it be fantastic to live there? She heads to the building enticed by cheap rent, a mysterious roommate wanted ad and “keen for my first whore haunting.”
“Off the Back of a Truck” is by far the best essay in the book. Another celebration of New York, here Crosley finds herself medicating her broken heart by buying fenced properties from a gruff warehouse worker. A rug, an ottoman, throw pillows, drawer pulls — her apartment is full of lovely things she would never be able to afford if not for her tie, Daryl. This bittersweet, insightful and amusing essay explores her relationship with a man who is with another woman all along with keen insight and contrasts it with the desire to buy the wonderful things just out of reach. The parallel is devious and well-worked, and Crosley’s hand is light and her tale sympathetic.
Sometimes reading HOW DID YOU GET THIS NUMBER is like listening to a excellent friend tell a excellent tale, but additional times it is like listening to a friend of a friend tell tale tales and brag too much. Crosley has a nice way with words, and her essays seem to be smirking excellent-naturedly. But she is occasionally too brash or rude (why call Paul Reubens a convicted child molester if it just isn’t right?) when she is more fun to be around in a more complimentary mood.
HOW DID YOU GET THIS NUMBER is not for every reader, of course, but what book is? Plenty of readers will be charmed by Sloane Crosley’s essays, and others cannot deny that her literary voice is a strong one and bound to get stronger as time goes on.
Reader’s Rating: 4 / 5
Sloane Crosley’s How Did You Get This Number is a fun ticket for travel adventure. I’ve spent my long week-end in Portugal, Alaska and especially New York City lacking leaving the comfort of my bedroom. She gave me a lot to laugh about (and the vicarious experience of being a young writer in New York City) The poignant and painful are regularly the well from which the most amusing is drawn. Because I come from a family tree with a variety of neurological and learning problems, I establish the chapter “Lost in Space” cutting very close to home. And therefore the talk of right-left brain discrepancy and “having the village idiot camped out in half your brain” customary a print cameraderie that kept me from putting this book down.(How could I not fall in like with a name who confesses near the beginning of the book that she’s never met a clock that works properly and has resorted to going to Canada to avoid the trauma of a week-end bus trip to her sister’s house?)
This book is very amusing, in that devious, laugh to yourself and underline parts so that you can read them to your friends way.
Reader’s Rating: 4 / 5
Sloane Crosely does it again. I adored her first collection of essays, I Was Told There’d Be Cake and this one continues the tradition. There has to be a place in heaven for a name who can spin a globe, point and then really go to that destination. She is so open and frank with her essays that they spark your own need to do things you wouldn’t normally do and not be worried. Or at least don’t worry about the failing part since that can make for a very humorous theme.
Crosley is quietly amusing…not the laugh out loud kind, but the thoughtful, I wish I had written that type. It all looks so effortless. My favorite essay has to be her trip to Alaska and the bear tale which I assume sparked the take in. Every time I hear a bell ring, I reflect of that one essay in which everyone must where a bell in order keep the bears away. If you delight in David Sedaris, or Agusten Burroughs, you will probably like this as well.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
How Did You Get This Number (rumor has it that, no question mark in that title) is a collection of nine essays, ranging in topic. In the opening essay, Crosley takes an unplanned, off-season excursion to Portugal for no apparent reason, and meets a troupe of clown college students; later, she discusses the relative merits and demerits of Alaska, when she attends a acquaintances wedding in “Light Pollution;” and later still she discusses getting thrown out of Paris (“I do not reflect you should come to this place again”), and having a dealer of furniture who will get you things “Off the Back of a Truck.”
These essays are permanently witty and sometimes amusing. There’s no real tie between any of them, but Crosley has a way with words that is regularly poignant and rings right. Sometimes her ramblings don’t make total sense, but I establish myself laughing out loud copious times while reading these essays. Crosley permanently manages to remain pragmatic about her experiences, even as she dates a guy who turns out to be no excellent, or accidentally breaks into a weirder’s courtyard in Paris, or shopping for roommates on Craigslist (been there, done that!). Embarrassing experiences like these are prime fodder for Crosley’s self-deprecating style, and she can even be philosophical about childhood games like Girl Talk (a game from my own adolescence I remember very well…). What I like about Crosley’s essays is that her experiences are so relatable.
There are some weak essays in the book (the two subjects of the last one in particular don’t seem to go together, and I didn’t reasonably “get” the one about taxis. In all, but, this is a very strong collection of essays, and a fantastic follow-up to I Was Told There’d Be Cake. Certainly worth reading if you’re looking for a humorous memoir where the leader doesn’t take herself too seriously.
Reader’s Rating: 4 / 5
I loved Sloane Crosley’s last book and so I ran out and bought a groundbreaking new copy of her latest, “How Did You Get This Number” ( I normally buy my books used on Amazon). Maybe I wasn’t in the right mood when reading it but I barely laughed out loud. With her first book, I was cracking up in public reading it, tears were coming down my face from laughing so hard. This book, not so much. Is it a excellent read? Eh, it’s okay. There was one chapter I establish very amusing about pets but besides that, I wasn’t that impressed. Worth checking out, but don’t expect it to be as amusing as the first.
Reader’s Rating: 3 / 5