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"  Two years ago, Sloane Crosley burst onto best-seller lists with a collection of dark and funny essays titled I Was Told There&amp;#039;d Be Cake. Working as a book publicist by day and journaling by night, the then-29-year-old captured her disaffected suburban childhood and her postcollege move to New York City with a signature Gen-Xer &amp;quot;whatever&amp;quot; attitude. Sharp insights into life&amp;#039;s mundane moments and a snarky voice in which to recount them earned Crosley an easy comparison to David Sedaris. Now another helping of the author&amp;#039;s biting wit has arrived in How Did You Get This Number (Riverhead). These essays again showcase a plucky first-person narrator who stays confident even when she gets lost in her own neighborhood and can&amp;#039;t tell right from left. But now she&amp;#039;s a more sophisticated writer, one who doesn&amp;#039;t rush to judge her quirky reactions. Witnessing a bear&amp;#039;s gruesome death in Alaska in &amp;quot;Light Pollution,&amp;quot; for example, Crosley shares that she tortures herself by &amp;quot;playing [traumas] over and over so they can haunt me for a disproportionate number of weeks to come,&amp;quot; then adds, &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s very healthy.&amp;quot; What puts Crosley over is her preternatural ability to slip into her offbeat interior world\u2014and cajole us into going there too. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.elle.com/culture/books/reviews/a11264/second-helpings-how-did-you-get-this-number-450883/>