From the writer of "How to Talk to a Widower" comes another bordering on dark comedy, this time a somewhat eccentric and behaviourally diverse Jewish family sit Shiva after the death of their father. The story is told through the eyes of cuckolded husband, brother and son, Judd Foxman as attending Shiva is also an escape from the car crash that was his life. His elder brother Paul has taken the reigns of the big, but possibly failing, family business, who is also having trouble with fertility; t...

Defines a new genre: "dick lit." A few moments of profound human interactions amid a sea of objectifying comments about women. Not a single female character passes by the author without some mention of her attractiveness or lack of as a sole criterion of her worth. Despicable.

This book is weak. I’m not usually a fan of novels that think they can hold their own merit on nothing but shock value and really bad sexual innuendos—I’m pretty sure this book may have overestimated itself. I’d even feel bad for it, but the fact that its shallow cliché-ness seems to beg for a Hollywood deal rather sucks up any pity I might have otherwise had.

One of the funniest novels I read last year. Jonathan Tropper has such an amazing, razor-sharp wit. I couldn't stop laughing, and there were a few unexpected moments where I got a little choked-up. A wonderful balance of humor and heart. The movie was just so-so. The book is so much better! I love Judd and his crazy, opinionated, and unapologetic family. They tell it like it is and then some. A must-read. :) Enjoy!

Being married to Jonathan Tropper could scare a woman to death. This man knows women, their thoughts, what motivates them, their foibles, their intellects. He can put it all out there, too. Besides, he's a very sexy writer--he knows men, too, especially the side of them that has that morning wood thing going on all day, every day. But Tropper is not out for anything other than to spin a really great yarn about a family of grown children who haven't really gotten along very well for most of their...

A grating combination of trying too hard to be funny, casual misogyny, and generally unsympathetic characters. Tropper also seems completely obsessed with judging the physiognomy and physiques of all of the characters, including minor ones that just show up to sit shiva or whatever. Heaven forbid that you grow old and expose any skin, or wear low-riding jeans postpartum. Everyone is physically icky except for the shining goddess of a wife who cheated on him, and all the women about whom he makes...

Voice Over: Judd Foxman had the perfect job...(on-air antics at the radio station; his boss makes a sexist joke)VO: the perfect girl...(hot young starlet (Jessica Biel?) smiles at camera)VO: The perfect life... Until one day, it left him behind.(smiling, Judd carries an ornate birthday cake into a bedroom. "Surprise, honey! Happy birthday!" Flash cut: Biel in bed, looking over a man's shoulder. "Judd!" The man turns, and it's Judd's boss. "Foxman! How's it hanging?" Back to Judd, who flings the

Be sure to visit my Favorites Shelf for the books I found most entertaining.I started This is Where I Leave You yesterday afternoon after picking up all four books I currently have on the go and hardly getting through a page before tossing them aside frustrated. I'm not in a rut. I want to read, but nothing holds my attention. Forget about all that. This book is excellent. It grabbed me right from the first page. I could not put it down. It kept me entertained for the entire afternoon to the poi...

Judd Foxwell is a broken, damaged man. He has found his wife cheating on him with his boss and then he gets the call his terminally ill father has passed away. His dying wish: to have his family - non practicing Jews - sit shiva for 7 days as final tribute to him in death. Except the 7 days are more like a forced quarantine for Judd and his 4 siblings. What ensues is a hot mess of grudges as wounds are reopened but as part of that process, they are finally given a chance to heal. This is a story...

I picked up this book on the recommendation of an acquaintance whose taste I trust. And in reading the dust jacket flap, I was immediately drawn in by the idea of the book: a family -- four siblings -- mourning the death of their father, coming together for seven days to sit shiva. The book promised to be witty and biting, an unforgiving look at family dynamic. I'm in. Sign me up.Eh.For sure there was some great language in here. Some sharp observations about disappointment and growing up and lo...

Does this story sound like it’d tickle your funny bone? Judd Foxman and his wife Jen lost a baby during the last months of her pregnancy. A year later, he catches her in bed with his boss, a crude radio shock-jock. Months after that, Judd doesn’t have a job and is living in a crappy apartment when he gets the news that his father finally died after long battle with cancer. Just then, Jen drops by to let him know that she’s pregnant. Judd’s even more shocked to learn that his father’s last reques...

This was a recommendation from Sarah of Sarah's Bookshelves blog and I loved it! If you enjoy funny and irreverent books about dysfunctional characters, this is the book for you. The death of the family patriarch brings together the Foxman family for seven days to sit shiva, their father’s last request. The enforced togetherness brings all the dysfunction to the forefront. What ensues is a mixture of hilarity with moments of poignancy. Highly recommended!

I really enjoyed this book and even a poorly-made movie can't bring it down. The characters felt like people I knew and I sometimes wondered what they were doing when I wasn't reading. The style and flow of this book worked very well and I have recommended it to many people.

"Seven days?""That's how long it takes to sit shiva.""We're not really going to do this, are we?"You have my deepest sympathies. I don't want to spend seven days with people I like much less spend them with my family.Well, a dying wish is a dying wish, and when patriarch Mort Foxman requests that his family sit shiva, well, DAMMIT!, they'd better do it. So, Judd, the narrator, moves back to the old homestead for seven days of communing with his three siblings and a whole lot of ghosts-of-not-so-...

I got book pushed into reading this book. Kelly and Snotchocheez both rated this book highly and I usually somewhat agree with them on books so I requested this sucker from the library.And..I loved it. How to get a five star review from this hateful reader? Characters that are so real that I expect them to drive up my driveway. Characters that have no filter on their mouths or their thoughts. A fucked up family that makes mine not look as bad. I'm not going to tell you what the book is a

“You never know when it will be the last time you’ll see your father, or kiss your wife, or play with your little brother, but there’s always a last time. If you could remember every last time, you’d never stop grieving.” Jonathan Tropper and Nick Hornby are two authors that seem to be on the same plane although from two different parts of the world. Sarcasm and dark humor are their specialty, and a few movie adaptations have followed in the wake of their novels. Sadly, even at the adamant ur

-Probably one of the most effective combinations of heartbreaking and hilarious I've ever read.-Something about it is cinematic, and almost begs to be turned into a movie (one that won't be as good as the book, of course), and subsequently a few of the plot points feel just very slightly bordering on cliché. -It took me most of the book before I began to realize that, due to the narrator's state of depression, he's a bit hard to like. But at the same time, it's his wry observations that make the...

Three stars feels a little generous because though the premise is promising (sitting shiva for their father, dysfuctional family must Learn to Get Along or Not) and it sailed along lightly (I could practically see the movie in my mind) the great big giant dollop of misogyny heaped on top really turned my stomach. Judd's constant snipes at women and their weight problems and their hotness quotient and typical male writers crap about the drag of being slave to their sex drive and the drag of being...

Meh. This book was fine, but it wasn't good. My main problem is that there seemed to be a lot of anger at and objectifying of women on the part of the main character, Judd Foxman. There was a lot of talking about women (both young and old) as body parts (though to be fair, this happened a lot with the descriptions of men too) and as vehicles for Judd's fantasies. I get it that his wife cheated on him, but still I didn't like this part of the narrative. Maybe I just wasn't supposed to like Judd a...

2 Stars This book was not as satisfying as I hoped it would be. This is Where I Leave You, is a book about a family of estranged and extremely fucked up individuals that come together to sit Shiva when their emotionally distant father passes away after his long battle with cancer. Our vessel into this world and family is Judd Foxman the middle child of four siblings and recently single after finding his wife of nine years having sex with his chauvinistic boss. A book I thought would be about ac