This Is Not About Us
Fiction
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- 10,99 €
Publisher Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A kaleidoscopic portrait of a modern American family—steadfast, complicated, begrudging, and loving—from the bestselling author of Isola
“Wise, witty . . . a deliciously readable book [about] the delicate minutiae of family life, played beautifully, boldly, brightly in a major key.”—The New York Times Book Review (Editors’ Choice)
“Goodman’s mature and deftly written book suggests that, in family as in art, there is no such thing as uncomplicated happiness.”—The Wall Street Journal
Was this just a brief skirmish, or the beginning of a thirty-year feud? In the Rubinstein family, it could go either way.
When their beloved sister passes away, Sylvia and Helen Rubinstein are unmoored. A misunderstanding about apple cake turns into a decade of stubborn silence. Busy with their own lives—divorces, dating, career setbacks, college applications, bat mitzvahs and ballet recitals—their children do not want to get involved. As for their grandchildren? Impossible.
With This Is Not About Us, master storyteller Allegra Goodman—whose prior collection was heralded as “one of the most astute and engaging books about American family life” (The Boston Globe)—returns to the form and subject that endeared her to legions of readers. Sharply observed and laced with humor, This Is Not About Us is a story of growing up and growing old, the weight of parental expectations, and the complex connection between sisters—a big-hearted book about the love that binds a family across generations.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
This multigenerational saga of family upheaval overflows with compassion. It all starts with a loaded dynamic between elderly Jewish sisters. At their younger sister Jeanne’s funeral, a petty argument between Helen and Sylvia over a dessert recipe ends in complete estrangement between the siblings. The subsequent chapters, which read like interconnected short stories, follow the rest of the Rubinstein clan, from the midlife travails of the sisters’ sons and daughters to how the grandchildren follow their own paths (not to mention their own resentments). We loved how Allegra Goodman (Isola) dives so fearlessly into the messiness, angst, and inevitable humour of dealing with family mishegas while trying to live your own life. She really captures the organic ebb and flow of mixed emotions. Don’t be surprised if you emerge from This Is Not About Us with a sympathetic view of even your most vexing family frictions.
