Hello? Who Is This? Margaret?
Essays
Hello? Who Is This? Margaret? is a funny and heartfelt essay collection that models leaping into the unknown and growing into oneself in the process.
Dani Alpert’s descriptive memoir-in-essays Hello? Who Is This? Margaret? muses through life events with sarcasm and hope.
Gazing back on life from a middle-aged perspective, Alpert reflects on the challenges she faced as a teenager, her never-ending dream of being a creative, and her tendency to persevere and push for what she wants, even when faced with rejection. Multiple failed relationships are treated with humor, as in an essay about “revenge travel” as a way of coping. Another triumphant essay recalls Alpert’s return to pole dancing in her forties. Elsewhere, staunch beliefs in child-free living are reflected in disdainful commentary regarding a breastfeeding Orthodox Jewish woman and memories of disconcerting events with Alpert’s two stepchildren. Real and imagined encounters with celebrities including Cher and Christopher Meloni are also covered.
The essays are ripe with hyperbole, heightening everyday situations: “My parents not only pushed me into traffic but also supplied the car that hit me.” Thus, distressing situations are tempered, as in the story of Alpert leaving a used condom in plain view on the rim of her lover’s bathtub for his mother to find, deciding “It was Brian’s problem now.” Rich descriptions help flesh out ordinary settings, as when Alpert details the contents of her family home, rifling through years of her parents’ artistic and intimate artifacts while quarantining after contracting COVID-19.
Some stories follow circuitous paths, though, as with the nonlinear recollection of her stepdaughter walking in on her partner, Julian, taking a shower; it includes interjections of notes regarding Alpert’s stepson and Julian’s decorating choices. While these deviations are loosely joined by the sexual nature of the various mishaps, some of their details still feel extraneous. Nonetheless, the ranging essays are held together by reigning themes of cautious optimism, resulting in unity on the whole. When Alpert recalls considering where to go to college and what to major in, for example, and feels hesitant to pursue her dreams of being on the stage, her fears lay the groundwork for later notes about Norman Lear’s open invitation to help her get started in her artistic career. How fear sometimes drove her decisions is a recurrent theme, resolved with the declaration that leaping into the unknown is necessary for one’s growth.
A confident and witty memoir-in-essays, Hello? Who Is This? Margaret? celebrates the growth that comes from responding to failures with determination and internal exploration.
Reviewed by
Jennifer Maveety
Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book and paid a small fee to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. Foreword Reviews and Clarion Reviews make no guarantee that the publisher will receive a positive review. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
