maedo's review against another edition
4.0
This collection of short stories may even be better than The Book of Dahlia, which is incredible because I loved The Book of Dahlia. Both emotionally satisfied and filled with envy, I want to write Elisa Albert a creepy love letter -- not unlike the one to Philip Roth that concludes this book.
ammonite's review against another edition
4.0
Albert knows how to turn a phrase in the precise way that hits my humor buttons.
arnie's review against another edition
3.0
These stories are all quite outlandish and very funny at times: at 31 visiting her parents for Passover with a urinary tract infection and her non-Jewish boyfriend; a young mother locking herself and her infant son in the bedroom to avoid the baby's bris; the mother at her son's Bar Mitzvah, unable to remember her own Torah portion and flirting with a 14 year old boy. I enjoyed some of these stories but felt others were forced, especially the last one in which the protagonist writes a letter to Philip Roth offering to have his baby. After Birth, published nearly a decade later, is a more mature and, I think, successful book.
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