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Umm, I'm not sure how to evaluate this book. I'd agree with Cynthia Ozick from Newsweek (quote on the cover) that it is politically and morally brave. Brave is a good word. And outrageous as other reviewers have said. Not simply outrageous. There's there there.

Roth's push back on Christianity's righteousness and purity in 1969 astounds: "They worship a Jew...There who big-deal religion is based on worshipping someone who was an established Jew...the the dirty bastards turn around afterwards and who is the first one on their list to persecute? who haven't they left their hands off of to murder and to hate for 2000 yrs? The Jews!" Yet any broad or philosophical statements ultimately serve the personal, the raging and soliliquized identity of Portnoy.

Roth opens the basement door and invites us into the depths of Portnoy's and Roth's (?) sexual desires. As Portnoy says to his therapist, "put the id back in the Yid." But again it's not simply a romp through lascivious and so-called debased behaviour. Yes, it is often crass (maybe brave?) while still profound, "What I'm saying, Doctor, is that I don't seem to stick my dick up these girls, as much as I stick it up their backgrounds � as though through fucking I will discover America."

I don't necessarily like Portnoy the character but I'm glad I know him. Uncensored, wild, real and certainly building the foundation for many Jewish characters to come in novels and film from Woody Allen to Larry David.