Allegra Goodman tells us how This Is Not About Us grew like a family tree from her New Yorker short story “Apple Cake,” as she continued writing about the Rubinstein family for over a decade. We discuss how her perspective - and the world - has changed since she wrote The Family Markowitz in her 20s, and how Keats’ concept of negative capability has shaped her writing. We also hear about a book that she found very dull until a bad cold taught her patience.

Allegra Goodman is a writer of extraordinary range and precision. Across novels and stories, she’s written about faith, ambition, family, science, history, and the quiet negotiations of everyday life, always with clarity, wit, and deep compassion for her characters. Allegra’s many books include among them Sam, a Jenna’s Book Club pick, Paradise Park, Kaaterskill Falls (a National Book Award finalist), and Isola (a Reese’s Book Club Pick.)

Her latest novel of interconnected short stories, This Is Not About Us, brings all of that together. It follows the Rubinstein family over many years, through moments that feel small until they suddenly don’t.

Allegra Goodman’s Five Books:

1. A book that is in conversation with your latest work:

The Family Markowitz

2. A Book You Changed Your Mind About:

The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James

3. A passage from a book that has stayed with you or has changed how you think about things:

A famous passage from one of John Keats' letters about Negative Capability

4. ⁠The Book You’re Reading Now:

Dickens the Enchanter: Inside the Explosive Imagination of the Great Storyteller by Peter Conrad

5. The Author’s Latest Work:

This Is Not About Us by Allegra Goodman

Allegra’s First Appearance on The Five Books can be found here: Allegra Goodman on Making the Exotic Familiar, and Finding the Modern in Ancient Worlds

This episode was recorded live in front of an audience in a joint event for subscribers to Nu Reads, a project from Jewish Book Council that brings remarkable Jewish literature straight to your door. This is Not About Us by Allegra Goodman is the Nu Reads pick for February. Learn more at https://www.nureads.org/

The Five Books is a partner organization of Jewish Book Council, a nonprofit dedicated to amplifying and celebrating Jewish literature and supporting authors and readers.

The Five Books is a podcast that celebrates the role of books in Jewish culture. Through author interviews, we delve into Jewish identity and discover each author’s favorite novels. Join us every week for new Jewish book recommendations! Some of our episodes have included conversations with Rabbi Sharon Brous (Senior Rabbi at IKAR, and author of The Amen Effect), Yael Van Der Wouden (author of The Safekeep), and Dara Horn (author of People Love Dead Jews.)

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Hosted by Tali Rosenblatt Cohen

Produced by Odelia Rubin

Live Event Production support by the incredible team at Nu Reads/ Jewish Book Council: Jamie Betesh Carter, Evie Saphire-Bernstein, Miri Pomerantz Dauber and Naomi Firestone-Teeter

Editorial and website support by Amelia Merrill

Artwork by Elad Lifshitz of the Dov Abramson Studio

Music by Dov Rosenblatt and Blue Dot Sessions.

Allegra Goodman on “This is Not About Us” (Or So We Tell Ourselves)