I found it difficult to relate to the characters appearing in these stories: they act weird and are surrounded by even stranger people. There are flashes of genius in the writing and I get the overall idea of each story but the narratives themselves frequently bored me. ( )

The short stories of Deborah Eisenberg are meticulously detailed descriptions of situations in contemporary American life. There is hardly any plot development, but insubsequent volumes, the stories do seem to become more unified and focussed. The stories give very detailed, atmospheric descriptions of American people, particularly from the point of view of women. The style of writing is very feminine.

Having finished three out of four volumes in this omnibus, I quit. I do prefer the later stories over the early stories, and they certainly grow on you, however, over all the stories are boring, and I cannot recall any. ( )