The Makings of a Nobody

How does somebody get to be a nobody? Influenced by the Women's Movement, in this memoir mixed with fiction the writer Ann Z. Leventhal reveals from her own and other people's points of view how an ordinary New York Jew married a lawyer, gave birth four times, overcame a diagnosis of epilepsy and depression, forged a bond with a cousin who once disliked her, enjoyed a love affair with a feminist scholar, benefitted from psychotherapy, freaked out her children, coped with sexism, attracted a genius, came to terms with her parents, survived her oldest son's suicide, communicated with her late husband, acquired a second spouse, outlasted his daughter's hostility, recovered from breast cancer, turned to teaching, bested a scammer, and triumphantly stuck around long enough to expose and celebrate her own invisibility.