Books

This is Not About Us

Allegra Goodman

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.

Hardback

ISBN: 9781800757325

Published: November 5, 2026

Ebook

ISBN: 9781800757332

Published: November 5, 2026

Category:
Fiction

Reviews for This is Not About Us

‘When I finished This Is Not About Us – I kid you not – I read it a second time … [Goodman] holds fast to the gifts that have marked her since her earliest books: psychological acuity, humour and an abiding curiosity about the volatile chemistry of people bound together by affinity, profession or blood’ – Maureen Corrigan, NPR

‘A nimble, heartfelt, acutely written collection that forms one wonderfully cohesive unit. As Goodman unpacks the little squabbles and triumphs of the Rubinsteins, an expansive Jewish clan in the Northeast, something big emerges. It’s a wise, witty exploration of a contemporary American family, and a deliciously readable book’ – New York Times Book Review

‘Goodman, always talented, is now a virtuoso, limber and graceful. She handles her sprawling cast with a sure, light touch, and her bantering dialogue is never trivial or canned … a welcome addition to any shelf of Goodman’s work’ – The Washington Post

‘Goodman finds the right measure of sugar in this novel-in-stories depicting three generations of Rubinsteins, an East Coast Jewish-American clan tenuously bound by love, ritual and guilt trips … 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

‘Allegra Goodman has written many wonderful novels, but her eleventh, This Is Not About Us, is her crowning glory’ – The Boston Globe

‘In this vibrant collection of linked stories … Allegra Goodman dissects the foibles and fantasies of her cast, from the three founding sisters to their offspring and offspring’s offspring’ – Time Most Anticipated Books of 2026

‘Allegra Goodman’s utterly charming new book is carving out new territory in the genre of linked short stories … A volume that builds and surprises on many fronts, the cacophony of love and discontent reifying into filigreed depictions of the familial ties that bind’ – Vogue Best Books of 2026 Preview

‘A compelling, love-laced portrait of several generations of a family much like yours, mine and just about everyone’s’ – People Magazine

Author

Allegra Goodman

Allegra Goodman is the author of seven novels, including the recent bestseller Isola, which was a Reese’s Book Club pick, Intuition, which was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction, and Kaaterskill Falls, which was shortlisted for the National Book Award. Her fiction has appeared in The New Yorker and elsewhere, and has been anthologized in The O. Henry Awards, and The Best American Short Stories. She lives with her family in Cambridge, Massachusetts.