A review by dillarhonda
Your Duck Is My Duck by Deborah Eisenberg

The stories of Deborah Eisenberg’s latest collection, Your Duck is My Duck, are as unsettling as they are compelling. My favorite, “Merge,” explores how a temporarily disowned trust fund baby falls in love with a strange woman who, after she leaves, mails cryptically frantic postcards that he ignores for a cushy reunion with his wealthy father. Others feature artists brought to a villa to entertain their wealthy hosts, a group of aging actors who are appalled by their representation in a memoir, and a young woman who is ‘normalized’ because she experiences life too intensely. Eisenberg’s observations are razor-sharp as ever and though each story features its own unique brand of cruelty, the title—based on a story of a zen master who sees a duck trapped in a bottle and says ‘not my duck, not my problem’—is a wry reminder to treat each other with care.