I think that all writers must feel a special kind of tenderness for their first novels. I certainly do for Are You Alone on Purpose? This novel began for me with a vision of a single pivotal scene: the one, early on in the book, in which Alison’s mother “curses” Rabbi Roth for his decision not to enroll Alison’s brother in Hebrew School. I had a vision of her screaming . . . and of Alison watching, listening, keeping her thoughts very private.
Of all the characters I’ve created, Alison Shandling is the closest on the surface to who and what I was at her age. But I made her smarter than me—both intellectually and emotionally. And I made her braver. She needs every bit of that courage, I think. With the plot of Are You Alone, I was trying quite deliberately to come up with a situation that would force Alison to confront her parents about her own needs, and that would also cause her to muse for the first time (but, I hope, not the last), on the place of God in the universe, given that the world contains so much pain and suffering.
Alison’s enemy and sweetheart, Harry Roth, remains a bit of a puzzle to me. He is a whirling dervish of pain himself, and I am still both incredulous and amused that Alison finds him so compelling. But she does. I retain a bit of nervousness for her, for her fearlessness in this regard. But I also think that she knows exactly what she’s doing. By the end, I trusted her instinct—and indeed, Harry’s.
Finally, I think of both the Shandlings and the Roths as “functional families.” They’re not perfect, but they try hard to cope with the difficulties in their lives, and they are all capable of change. And by the end of the book, they’ve managed, somehow, to communicate across the divides that separate them.
I believe that human beings are capable of understanding each other. I also believe it’s hard, hard work. Everyday work. Heroic work.