Book Review: This is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper

This is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper is Tropper's fifth book and it is one of the best books I read in 2009. The book is narrative in nature and your narrator is Judd Foxman. Foxman is a man on the brink. His marriage is ending he just quit his job and now he has to sit Shiva for seven days with the rest of his family to fulfill his dead father's final wish. Foxman also finds out that his wife is pregnant. Since she has been having an affair with Foxman's boss for the past year Foxman does not know if he or the man who has been "banging his wife" is the father.

Tropper does a fantastic job setting everything up for what many may consider the most depressing book of the decade. Wrong, wrong, wrong. This book is laugh out loud funny. There were parts were I actually snorted out loud recognizing myself and my family in Troppers characters even though we are all Irish and the Foxmans are non-practicing Jews.

Along with Judd the others who inhabit the book are his mother a world famous shrink who wrote the premier book on child rearing. To say her advice works better in theory then practice is an understatement. You also have both of Foxman's brothers. One older and one younger. They are both a mess in their own way and both as lost as Judd. Throw in Wendy the oldest and only girl along with her workaholic husband and her three children and pandemonium ensures.

Along the way you will meet the neighbor Linda and her son Horrry who sustained a brain injury that leaves him just retarded enough to not be able to live by himself but with enough knowledge to know what he is missing, including Wendy the love of his life. A few old girlfriends make a brief appearance along with an older woman involved with Foxman's youngest brother Philip. Judd's wife Jen is not the only one who is dealing with pregnancy related issues and Judd's boss Wade brings a hatred for a boss to a whole new level.

Sitting Shiva with his mother and three siblings forces Foxman to confront the current and past demons of his life along with at least attempting to try and figure out where he is going. The Rabbi, Paul's best friend who used to look at porn and smoke weed at the Foxman's home as a teen is delightful as a man who is trying to distance himself from his past with people who held his head while he puked basically an impossible task.

This book is highly recommended to anyone who has a family and can embrace the dysfunction and love that goes along with sharing your life with even a single person.

Tropper is currently working on adapting this novel into a screenplay. If he is able to bring the characters to life on film as he has done in this book I will be first in line on opening night.