I am only going to mention her brother once, and just to say that David Sedaris once mentioned his sister Amy loved to throw parties.  So when I heard she wrote a book on entertaining, I figured she was the real deal.  Back in 2006, I was having the best year of my life, working half time, bicycling 100+ miles a week, and hiking.  But these activities did not involve any of the other six billion people on the planet.  While I had hosted house-guests for 2 or 3 days I had never thrown a party.  So I was on the lookout for knowledge.  When the “I Like You” book tour came through the NPR studios, I placed an order.  And like all books, it entered my “to read” shelf where volumes travel forward in time for years.  In the interim, I started dating, then married, a woman who was good at throwing parties.  I could run on auto-pilot, with just the occasional trip for rented tables.  Ironically it was a party that started the end of that period of my life.  So without a live-in event planner, I pulled “I Like You” off the shelf.

The book starts off with mainly party advice sprinkled with occasional recipes.  Gradually it becomes entirely recipes with about a 1:2 ratio in the end.  Fortunately there is an index for all of the dishes.  Most of the advice is serious, sometimes she is clearly pulling your leg.  Given Amy’s off the wall sense of humor, its left to the reader to decide which is which.  Virtually any situation is handled: dinner parties, unexpected guests, handling drunks.  It’s like Emily Post for the unpretentious.  Amy staged an incredible number of photographs for the book.  They appear to all have been taken inside her actual apartment, including food, decoration ideas, and some pretty interesting pictures of herself.