RavePop MattersWhen You Are Engulfed in Flames presents 20-some story/essays about Sedaris\' life and it would be no small task for me to single out any piece in this collection which did not incite audible laughter in this reader, much to the dismay of the other patrons of the local coffeehouse I periodically pollute with my guffawing ... In fact, Sedaris does his job too well. So well, in fact, that when one is reading Flames they cannot help but cringe imagining the legions of bloggers, fan fictionistas, freshmen comp majors, et al. who are currently scrambling to emulate the style which Sedaris lays out time and time again ... Sedaris is so consistent that he nears literary machinery but never loses an ounce of warmth or humanity.
