Fleishman is in Trouble

Locations
Call Number: Fiction / Brodesser-Akner, Taffy, Adult Book / Fiction / General / Brodesser-Akner, Taffy
On Shelf At: Downtown Library, Malletts Creek Branch, Pittsfield Branch

"Dr. Toby Fleishman wakes up each morning surrounded by women. Women who are self-actualized and independent and know what they want--and, against all odds, what they want is Toby. Who knew what kind of life awaited him once he finally extracted himself from his nightmare of a marriage? Who knew that there were women out there who would actually look at him with softness and desire? But just as the winds of his optimism are beginning to pick up, they're quickly dampened, and then extinguished, when his ex-wife, Rachel, suddenly disappears. Toby thought he knew what to expect when he moved out: weekends and every other holiday with the kids, some residual bitterness, tense co-parenting negotiations. He never thought that one day Rachel would just drop their children off at his place and never come back. As Toby tries to figure out what happened and what it means, all while juggling his patients at the hospital, his never-ending parental duties, and his new, app-assisted sexual popularity, his tidy narrative of a spurned husband is his sole consolation. But if Toby ever wants to really understand where Rachel went and what really happened to his marriage, he is going to have to consider that he might not have seen it all that clearly in the first place. A searing, funny, and electric debut from one of the most exciting writers working today, Fleishman Is In Trouble is an exploration of a culture trying to navigate the fault lines of an institution that has proven to be worthy of both our great wariness and our great optimism"-- Provided by publisher.

REVIEWS & SUMMARIES

COMMUNITY REVIEWS

So Good I Got On The Wrong Bus submitted by jmwink_ on July 19, 2019, 3:12pm The other day I was sitting at the bus stop with my head buried in this book. There was suddenly a bus in front of me. I didn't want to look up from the page so I just got on the bus. 10 minutes later I was on the wrong side of town and my fiancee had to come pick me up.

Fleishman is in Trouble is about a recently divorced man whose wife ghosts him and his kids. Toby is convinced he did everything right in their marriage, or most things anyways, and doesn't understand where it went wrong. Luckily, there's a second-person narrator who can grasp at what went wrong, as well as what went wrong in the narrators own life, what is wrong with New York City, what is wrong with growing older, and what is wrong with just being a woman who has to be alive. It's heartwrenching and funny and very Jewish in a way that will be satisfying to Jewish people who love Seinfeld and unnoticable to non-Jewish people who love Seinfeld. If, as I did, you spent a semester in Israel once, you either know Fleishman or you are Fleishman, and I'm not sure which one is worse.

A Commentary on Marriage and Womanhood submitted by sns101 on August 27, 2021, 11:00am A powerful novel that dissects marriage and the uneven societal expectations of women, through the lens of an unsympathetic male protagonist. I loved this book for its artfully delivered feminist message and how the fictional story revealed the very real woes of womanhood, albeit in a very elite part of American society. But I was also interested in hearing more of Rachel’s voice and less of Toby’s in the book, partly because the author did such a good job of painting Toby as a schmuck. Still, the narrative structure was neat and interesting, and it’s a story I’ll remember beyond the characters for its deeper meaning. Well worth a read.

SO GOOD submitted by Sumerton on June 11, 2023, 1:43pm This book is extremely well done. I've not read a portrayal of marriage and how women are treated in our culture that does it better. I was continually sending pictures of passages to friends. Well written, thoughtful -- a very satisfying read!

Actually, the book is NOT so good, it is rather trivial. Maybe if they give it to good actors, the movie will be much better. submitted by Tassos on October 28, 2023, 7:02pm I can barely read this stupid book, and I am a bookworm. The author sure as hell is no Tolstoy. I am barely done with 20% of the stupid book but I will try to read the rest of it. If it is unbearably poorly written too, I will wait for the movie. AND I will NOT see it in the movie theater, but wait for the AAPL to buy it and will then rent it. Because as the saying goes, if you get burned with the soup, you try to cool the... yogurt too.