My Miserable Lonely Lesbian Pregnancy | 
| Author: Andrea Askowitz
Publisher: Cleis Press
Category: Book
List Price: $14.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  8 reviews
Sales Rank: 134193
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 241
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 4.9 x 0.9
ISBN: 1573443158
Dewey Decimal Number: 306.8743092
EAN: 9781573443159
ASIN: 1573443158
Publication Date: April 28, 2008
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Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: A brand new book in perfect condition!! You'll tremble with ecstasy when this book gets to you!!! =) No remainder mark.
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Product Description
In this memoir of her 40 weeks and five days in hell, Andrea Askowitz takes an unflinching look at her pregnant life from struggling with hormones to poor body image to a self imposed exile from family to take us on a ride through the turbulence of single lesbian motherhood. Along the way we meet her liberal parents as they struggle with their daughter's choices, the lover she longs to reconnect with who goes M.I.A. before the pregnancy, the friends who turn out to be no help at all and strangers who offer up some unlikely kindness. Andrea presents herself real, raw, impossibly cranky yet deeply touching with her self-deprecating dark sense of humor that will make you wince or better yet send you into uncontrollable fits of laughter
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| Customer Reviews: Read 3 more reviews...
 Pregnancy is Not for the Weak of Heart or Stomach! July 7, 2008
My Miserable, Lonely, Lesbian Pregnancy is author, Andrea Askowitz's brutally honest memoir recounting the months she spent trying to get pregnant, actually pregnant, and as a new mother. As can be easily discerned from the title, Andrea did not enjoy being pregnant and she makes no effort to sugarcoat her experience. Askowitz is frank and extremely open in describing the messy and oftentimes unpleasant experiences involved with pregnancy and child birth.
What makes My Miserable, Lonely, Lesbian Pregnancy work as a memoir is the balance that Askowitz manages to maintain between candid description of her opinions and admission that those opinions might have been skewed by her own gloom. Askowitz pulls no punches in describing her bitter disappoint with her friends, her ex-girlfriend, and her family; however, her harsh judgments are tempered by her acknowledgment that her estimations were not always fair and that she was a big pain in the neck. Askowitz's ability to call herself out on her own issues makes her endearing and likeable.
Askowitz's ability to be so unguarded in her writing oftentimes results in uproarious hilarity. Her recounting of her arguments and passive-aggressive altercations with her therapist will leave readers in stitches. She is candid, annoying, funny, loving, infuriating, and a whole host of other contradicting descriptions that make a person complicated and interesting.
Overall, this is a thoroughly enjoyable memoir that lifts the curtain on the rosy, glowing pregnancy facade that is usually presented to reveal the difficult, hard, and ugly side of pregnancy.
I do, however, feel a responsibility to future readers to mention that this might not be the book for those who consider themselves exceptionally squeamish, prudish, or easily offended.
 Loved It June 30, 2008
I laughed, I cried, I laughed some more . . . Andrea's story was funny and very real -- everyone can identify with some aspect of this lonely, lesbian, pregnant (and very funny) woman.
not as bad as I thought June 19, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Okay, so as a gay man I wasn't really interested in reading this book but a friend of mine insisted her and her friends thought it was hilarious and biting, which they seem to think is right up my alley (I wonder). Thus I gave the book a shot and really it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, in fact it does have it's moments of biting sarcastic humor, not quite as literistic as say Sedaris but still, better than most. Ms. Askowitz does lay it all out there and sometimes comes off as a whiner and you really just want to tell her to get over it and be happy or at least move on from the ex-girlfriend Kate, who really, it seems, is just dragging her down. But I'm guessing one can chalk her continual moodiness up to the over stimulation of hormones pregnant women go through, or at least I hope that is the case. It seems so as towards the end of the book she comes to some kind of acceptance for being a single mom and loving the little one she has given birth to, she almost seems relaxed for her new role. I'm not going to say every gay man should read this, because let's face it most could care less, but for those other few of us and for single women looking to have a child, it's worth a read.
As Cranky, Foul-Mouthed, and Funny As She Wants To Be May 12, 2008
7 out of 8 found this review helpful
This book may have a rubber ducky on it and a baby born at the end of it, but beyond that, it has little to do with most parenting/pregnancy books, and the fact that Askowitz is single or a lesbian aren't, ultimately, what sets it apart so much as her outlook. She's supposed to be ecstatic; she split up with her long-term girlfriend and went through the rounds of picking out a sperm donor specifically so she could become the mom she's longed to be.
But she's not happy. At all. She misses her girlfriend fiercely, and is still dealing with the harrowing death of her lifelong friend. Both of these events, the breakup and the loss of her friend, form the backdrop to the growing life inside of her. Yet they don't stop Askowitz from being scathingly hilarious, sparing no one, including her siblings, parents, extended family, friends, exes, coworkers and Lesbian Camping. When talking about how her ex-girlfriend Kate gained 40 pounds while they were together, Askowitz doesn't hide her revulsion, and upon being asked "Would you want my body?" Askowitz replies "No, but it's perfect on you." Askowitz then wonders, "Why couldn't I have said nothing, or changed the subject?" It might be tough to take if your its recipient, but as a reader, Askowitz has taken her best moments and turned them into something that readers can laugh at.
Oh, and she also rightly calls Sex and the City on a particularly self-loathing moment, which Amazon probably won't let me repost (it has the "p" word in it). Prepare for a lot of profanity. Prepare to sometimes get sick of Askowitz's whining. Prepare to laugh uproariously at very simple but moments, like her reflections on one of her potential sperm donors: "5599's brother was diagnosed and treated for obsessive-compulsive disorder at 21. He wrote: `My brother's health is excellent. He's taking medication, and he's fine now.' His maternal grandmother drank herself to death at 45. He'd probably say she's fine now. He's out."
Sometimes it's hard to wonder just how those in her life put up with Askowitz's demands during her pregnancy, yet this is what makes powerful memoir: honesty. She doesn't sugarcoat her grouchiness or the intensity of labor. And perhaps the most vital story here isn't about Askowitz becoming a mother, but searching for acceptance from her family after feeling like the family freak after she came out as a teenager. The end is the tearjerker the rest of the book hasn't quite prepared you for, yet she still ends on a note so befitting this book, I'll just have to quote it: "Excuse me, Dana, that's my tit."
Askowtiz may have been miserable and lonely, but this book is full of humor, not the kind going for cheap easy laughs, but a very strongly Jewish, feminist, often righteous, lesbian brand of humor Askowitz was clearly born with. It's uncensored, full of dyke drama, told in sometimes brief diary snippets, with other asides into her childhood in Los Angeles. This memoir has roots, and will make you laugh as well as cry as it goes from childhood to death to birth and circles through the three. I'm glad Askowitz didn't try to soften any of her edges, because her sadness, flashes of anger, moments of self-pity and doubt coincide perfectly with her humor and faith in the future and her child. And you so don't need to be a lesbian or pregnant to enjoy it (though I'd imagine being either will make it an even better read).
Going it Alone May 11, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Askowitz, Andrea. "My Miserable, Lonely, Lesbian Pregnancy", Cleis Press, 2008.
Going it Alone
Amos Lassen
I never thought that I would enjoy reading a book about a lesbian being pregnant, but I must say I absolutely loved Andrea Askowitz's "My Miserable, Lonely, Lesbian Pregnancy". It is tremendously funny and honest at the same time as well as being a bit "naughty".
There is no question in my mind that Andrea Askowitz is what we call a "Jewish American princess" or more familiarly a jap. She is unmarried and she is a loner. More important is that she decided to become a mother even though she is not in a relationship and still is upset that our last affair did not work out. But she is a lesbian and she is proud of that. Her adventures and misadventures had me smiling the entire time that I read her book.
She also provides us with some valuable information like an alternative view to reproduction and how a lesbian with a liberal bend feels about becoming a parent. I came out of this book really liking not only the book but the author as well. It's a fun read so get a copy and see for yourself.
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