Night Night Fawn

by Jordy Rosenberg

From the author of Confessions of the Fox comes a novel in which a yenta on her deathbed begins to look back at all her failures—including her child.

In a cluttered rent-controlled apartment in the middle of Manhattan, Barbara Rosenberg - old world yenta, committed homophobe, accomplished jazzercizer - is terminally ill, high on opioids, and writing the story of her life. Forget about her late husband, her career as the receptionist for an Upper East Side plastic surgeon, and her failed aspirations to be an actress. What she really wants to talk about are her unhinged thoughts on gender, Karl Marx, Jewish diaspora, and her two great disappointing loves: an estranged trans son and a long lost best friend whose betrayal haunts Barbara still. As she descends further into delirium and illness, Barbara's theories get wilder, and her circumstances put her on a crash course with these intimates once again.

Part novel, part someone's mother's unauthorized memoir, this novel is a timely exploration of sexuality, intergenerational conflict, and who gets to have an intellectual life.

Genres: Fiction, Literary Fiction, Queer, LGBT, Contemporary, Audiobook, Jewish

Unknown Binding

First published March 3, 2026

About the author

Jordy Rosenberg is a Professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. His novel, Confessions of the Fox, was published in 2018 by Random House US/Canada, Allen and Unwin AUS/NZ, and Atlantic Books UK. In 2021 Paseka published Confessions in Czech. A new novel, Night Night Fawn, is forthcoming from Random House/One World in 2026.

Reviews

[Bonnie G. · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is hard to properly review this book without spoilers, but I am going to do my best to give people a sense of why they should read this surprising, hilarious, heartbreaking. imperfect and brilliant novel.

In these pages, we walk through the final days of Barbara Rosenberg, the prototype for the social-climbing Manhattan-via-Brooklyn Jewish mother of the late 20th/early 21st century. Barbara is smart and she is relentless. And yet she fails at her prime directive, thus leading a life of endless disappointment. There is a point in the book where Barbara is described as Barbra Streisand in a biopic of Barbra, where she is played by Joan Crawford. That is not wholly inaccurate, and funnier than my take, which is a cross between Joan Rivers and Fran Fine's mother on The Nanny, with a very healthy dose of my own mother. Barbara lies in an Oxy haze as pancreatic cancer gets its last laugh, and goes back and forth between relating her present (and I will just say the reader needs to bear in mind that a dying person on Oxy is not the most reliable of narrators) and reviewing her life to this point. Barbara, again like my mother, is possibly looking to atone, and instead chooses self-justification for the most part. Everything has disappointed her, and nothing so much as raising a daughter whom she dressed in velvet and sent to Spence and who turned out to be, in Barbara's words, a "bulldagger." I am guessing this is deeply autobiographical. The disappointing daughter is even named Jordana. Even if this is not autobiographical, it tells someone's story, or really many people's stories. I felt like it told a lot of my story with my mother. I am not, like Jordy, trans. But like Barbara, were my mother still alive, she would spend hours telling you the ways in which I was a disappointment; I know that because when she was alive, she was happy to do that over a salad and a Tab whenever the opportunity arose. Like my own mother, though, Barbara is not a villain. She is someone who believes in every fiber of her being that she is helping her daughter to be what she has been trained to consider a success, and like my mother, she is baffled by her spectacular failure to create that person despite doing all the right things.

I am going to stop talking about the content of the book here because going in mostly blind is a great idea. So much of this is surprising and emotionally intense (in a non-manipulative way), and there are plenty of laughs to balance out the gutting parts. I wonder if this is accessible to people who have not spent a good bit of time around a particular type of Jewish matron, but the aforementioned The Nanny, Seinfeld, and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel were popular, so I guess this might be too. I hope so, because Jordy Rosenberg has served up his truth in a way that feels like he has performed surgery to excise and hold up to the light his emotional center. I don't think he incorporated the supernatural/mythical elements (the hawk and the fawn) well, but it is, to my mind, a minor quibble. If you think all the stories have already been told, this book will tell you otherwise.

I listened to this read by the author, and Rosenberg does a great Jewish matron.

[Rose · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow yeah okay! The epigraph ponders telling a story through the eyes of an SS Officer and I think that really sets the tone of this book. This follows Barbara, a Jewish woman from New York who is dying and reflecting on her life in all its disappointment while being cared for by her gender non-conforming child who she considers to be the biggest disappointment of all. Barara's voice really stands out, she's evil, delusional, and dare I say a bit camp.

Her story really cleverly envelops this ordinary Jewish American family’s involvement in the Zionist movement. I appreciated how this explored the conversations taking place within the community at the time, defying the narrative that this has always been a movement universally supported by American Jews.

The gender stuff is of course really good if hard to read at times. We do not access the child’s perspective of growing up queer and gender non conforming, we just watch through Barbara’s homophobic and transphobic eyes.

Rosenberg is such a smart author and this really comes through here, this is such a clever and unique book that will stick with me for a long time.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the eARC

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another one of those fever dream books that you can't really remember specifics of after you finish reading (except for THOSE scenes), but while reading you were amazed by the language, and the insight. And the audacity. If you don't enjoy "unlikable characters" you will not like this book. But if you like reading about flawed people, Barbara Rosenberg will provide. Oh boy, will she ever.

30 Books in 30 Days—2026
Book 23/30

[CJ · Rating 5 out of 5]

How is this possibly so good I am so fucked up. How is this at the same time a) a Philip Roth novel, like a good one and b) the most personally important to me thing I’ve read about being a transmasc kid with a complicated mother who is like WHERE IS MY DAUGHTER c) a Marxist endeavor that is funny d) a book about freeing Palestine that is somehow satirically narrated by a Zionist character. Also there is a bird. WHAT. Marry me, Jordy Rosenberg.

[Kasa Cotugno · Rating 5 out of 5]

Night Night Fawn joins the increasingly large number of books addressing end of life issues as witnessed by someone on their deathbed. What sets this one apart is that Jordy Rosenberg has given voice to Barbara Rosenberg, an elderly woman who is facing death in her rent controlled apartment that she has lived in for decades. She finds herself reliant on the ministrations of her only offspring, a trans daughter whose sexual orientation Barbara has been aware of since early on and who has been estranged for a good deal of her life. In addition to the physical indignities she suffers, she also is heavily reliant on opiods for relief. I wonder at the choice of her last name, ponder if this isn't a form of metafiction, and applaud the entire project as it will remain with me for a long time.

[Lorin (paperbackbish) · Rating 3 out of 5]

An objectively talented writer, but this particular story just wasn’t for me.

[Sarah Jaffe · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have been waiting for this book for...well, since I finished Confessions of the Fox. And it did not disappoint.

[Jenika K · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are so many well-crafted sentences I kept pausing just to admire them.

[August Driussi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Are the transphobes okay? NO! In this brilliant dark comedy, a Zionist yentel on her deathbed enumerates her life's many disappointments, including her son: a trans man, a Marxist, and... a giant owl?? Come for the unhinged stream of interfamilial bitterness, stay for the stinging Proustian insights.

[Kassandra Harris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thank you NetGalley for the eARC. Reading through this synopsis I thought this book would be great. But the execution of it felt disjointed, meandering and really hard to connect with the main character. It’s a quick read though and the last 10% was great.

[Lux · Rating 4 out of 5]

If my mother were a self-centered, transphobic lunatic, I would also write autofiction about it; but to write it from her own point of view is, I think, a genius move, or at the very least an innovative way of dealing with one's mommy issues.

[Diane Rusert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Barbara Rosenberg, one hilarious, bigoted, self centered Mother. This story obviously at least mostly biographical as far as the characters go is so incredibly well written. I ofcourse had alot of compassion for the daughter who Barbara did everything she could to not accept until the bitter end, but also a teeny tiny bit for Barbara who’s self centeredness was deep and ingrained due to how disappointed she was by everyone. This resonated with my experience of my own Mother.

[Christopher Johnston · Rating 5 out of 5]

Elegantly shows the non-intuitive ways that gender essentialism and fascism are joined at the hip.

[Eileen · Rating 2 out of 5]

1.5 STARS. I hate to leave a low rating on a book knowing how much work goes into the writing. I also believe in being honest, so here it goes….
I could not relate to this book, and I believe it was disjointed and confusing at times. I found Barbara/Fawn to be extremely unlikable. I almost did not finish this, but I kept thinking it will get better. In my opinion, It really didn’t. Who was the bird? Part V: Fawn This were writings from Sugar’s notebook? This part was especially confusing. I do not recommend.

[Janalyn, the blind reviewer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Night Night Fawn by Jordie Rosenblum, we meet Jewish wife and mother Barbara Rosenberg who’s ill at the end of her life. As she looks over her life with her husband Steve and her daughter who’s never named we learn about her daughter who rather dress like a boy than a girl her husband who she thinks is wishy-washy with no opinion of his own at the best of times it didn’t sound like she was all too affectionate with her child but it is her daughter who at the end of her life is there taking care of her not that Barbara can remember day-to-day but she does remember that she comes around now and then. Even though in the book we learned the daughter lives with her and even brings her girlfriend over for overnight something that really hurt Barbara. There are many things in this book that had me thinking this must be a real person and a real thoughts because it was not only hilarious but so I don’t wanna say relatable but familiar. From her jazz size to the plastic surgeon she worked for all her grievances the whole situation with the picture at the funeral I mean this book is hilarious. I really was hoping that would be a resolution by the end with her and her daughter and whether there was or not I won’t say you’ll have to read the book but if you love a funny book and love Jewish women then you’ll definitely enjoy this book I know I certainly did it was truly a funny yeah down to fiction memoir that I definitely enjoyed. there were times when certain family members were around that had me rolling like when Stan paid for them all to eat at that fancy restaurant and she was sitting next to sugar OMG that was funny I just really enjoyed this book. just be warned she doesn’t like the fact her daughter is either trans or lesbian and she’s very vocal about that and there’s also lots of talk about her over using her OxyContin so if those are triggers maybe don’t read this. #NetGalli, #TheBlindReviewer, #HonestReview,

[Annie Blum · Rating 5 out of 5]

Am I rounding up here?? Possibly/probably. But this book was undeniably transgressive and completely fearless. The character of Barbara is so complicated, she's hateful and cruel but that's her understanding of being a mother. I have to celebrate Jordy Rosenberg's efforts here, especially if it is even slightly meta-fictional (which it is obviously implied to be very much the case) because it is a totally brave storytelling feat with a really sincere payoff.

[Divya · Rating 5 out of 5]

jordy rosenberg has done it again i fear

[Clem McNabb · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jordy's book is as the front insert describes - 'part novel, part someone's mother's unauthorized memoir - all diatribe, gutter schtick, and deranged manifesto'. He writes the voice of his deeply transphobic, homophobic, zionist mother as she lies dying from cancer. For once in her life, she is out of control, at the mercy of her trans son (Jordy). I know this is not a thrilling pitch, but the book is so funny and audacious that you quickly fall in love. Her voice is addictive in its cruelty, the sharpness of her observations of others. Jordy appears at her bedside as part lame lesbian, and bird like creature, fitted with wings. As the book progresses, he becomes more and more mythical. My daughter is trying to kill me, she tells anyone who will listen. But there is no one to hear, except her long term friend/enemy Sugar, and said trans son. I won't spoil anymore, but I can't recommend enough. Favorite trans book.

Mid way through she writes of Jordy -

But you took it to the in-betweens, a life no one I know would even call a life. I'm not trying to be hurtful, I'm just telling you how it is. One minute I was holding a baby in a green lounger thinking I'd give you everything I never had and still don't, but maybe through you, I'd get to experience it too. And the next minute, you'd glimpsed some trick of light and taken it for a beacon, a planet. Before I knew it, you had set off in the night with other women, looking to fly into orbits. As if it was enough to love the sky with women. As if a person could do that their whole life.

[MC · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simply incredible. Rosenberg has done it again. Confessions of the Fox was one of the best books I’ve read in the last decade and Night Night Fawn is probably up there. Barbara Rosenberg’s voice is soooo precise, such a sharp and perfectly clear character. So much to say about social striving and motherhood and desperately wanting to be seen in a way that nobody is acknowledges. but honestly that’s not even what the book is about. It’s a trans gay Marxist anti-Zionist intertextual trip. And fucking hysterical. I dunno I will have to reflect more to say something more astute about it but reading it was such an experience. Jordy Rosenberg you are the goat. Also the Zohran Mamdani shout out in the acknowledgments was a crazy surprise.

[AJ · Rating 5 out of 5]

maybe my favourite writer? excited to read this again when I’m smarter lol

[Greg · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an unflinching, often claustrophobic novel that unfolds almost entirely within the mind of a woman approaching death from cancer. It is less a conventional narrative than a sustained act of consciousness—fragmented, digressive, biting, and darkly funny. The effect is immersive but also demanding, as the reader is asked to inhabit a mind that is as abrasive as it is vulnerable.

Its unwavering commitment to this singular voice is the novel’s greatest strength. Yet this narrator is not an easy companion. She is consumed by a need for admiration and validation, which manifests in relentless self-justification and a tendency to measure others against her own unmet expectations. Her relationships, especially with her family, are filtered through a lens of jealousy and resentment that can feel stifling. Notwithstanding her sharp, distinctly Jewish wit, the narrator’s tendency toward self-laceration, biting irony and a finely tuned sense of the absurdities of family life and bodily decline can be wearing. Yet there are moments when humor cuts through the dread of mortality with a kind of defiant elegance. Indeed, Rosenberg adeptly captures a New York sensibility with her. She is quick, neurotic, steeped in cultural memory, and often brutally honest. (Not unlike a David Sedaris monologue).

Most troubling is her fixation on her daughter, whose sexuality becomes a focal point for the narrator’s anxieties and attempts at control. These passages are painful, sometimes infuriating to read. They seem to be deliberately devoid of easy moral resolution. Her efforts to manipulate and reinterpret her daughter’s identity reveal not only generational and cultural tensions but also the narrator’s own deep insecurity and fear of irrelevance.

The novel has a few minor shortcomings. Rosenberg does not seem interested in making this woman conventionally likable. Instead, he leans into her contradictions. She is both perceptive and delusional, cruel and wounded, funny and exhausting. This refusal to soften her edges gives the book a kind of integrity but also risks alienating some readers. Likewise, the novel’s stream-of-consciousness approach can feel meandering. Thoughts loop back on themselves, memories blur into present sensations, and time becomes elastic. This can mirror the disorientation of illness and dying but does test patience. Moreover, the lack of narrative momentum gives one a sense of stasis. She is not so much moving toward resolution as circling an inevitable end.

In the final analysis, Night Night Fawn is less about plot than about what it feels like to be inside a mind reckoning with its own extinction. It is a challenging, sometimes abrasive work that captures a very particular voice with remarkable fidelity. While the narrator may be hard to admire, the novel’s commitment to an uncomfortable honesty makes it a compelling, if not always enjoyable, read.

[Susan L · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wild ride! The author lays down a tale of death and dying with so much verve, personality, openness, and sense of place and culture that’s the opposite of sentimental and overly self important. Night Night Fawn takes a sledgehammer to a confined predictable narrative structure.

Barbara Rosenberg might be hallucinating on OxyContin or she might be surrounded by people from her present or past; she may have collected journal entries or somehow written her own history while dying - who knows? It may only be safe to say that she is living her last days in an overly stuffed and tiny UES apartment - east of Third Avenue which is a thing (who knew?) amidst the jackhammers of the Second Avenue subway construction. And she is/was a very funny person - opinionated, bigoted, and struggled in life. Despite her mountain of well worn disappointments, she smelled, felt and, in her own style, cherished her family and friends.

[Sharon · Rating 4 out of 5]

An immersive, autofictional account of the life of Barbara Rosenberg. This novel is audacious and does not shy away from its complicated protagonist. Barbara is woefully misguided, homophobic, and a Zionist, but she is a spitfire, opinionated, and wildly entertaining to read from. Despite her dashed hopes and dreams, she lived with fire to the end.
While I do applaud this novel’s ambitions, for me it worked best when concentrating on Barbara’s POV. The latter chapters felt weaker, although I do see what Jordy Rosenberg was trying to do. The speculative elements also felt weaker in comparison to everything else and I could have done without them. Finally, the novel was quite dense, which I was expecting partly because of attempting and failing to read Confessions of the Fox.
Overall, I’d recommend this book to a specific kind of reader. If you like books featuring flawed, unlikable women, books featuring strained familial relations (particularly with a mother and child), and books recounting one’s life story, I’d recommend.

[Jack · Rating 5 out of 5]

He made a page addressing the font he printed his book in. I am in love with this man.

[Kellie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Having a hard time moving on to my next read as this one has left me thinking and arranging and rearranging the pieces. I loved this book. I found the character of Barbara to be so perceptive and hilarious and narrow minded and unlikeable, but somehow sympathetic. Night Night Fawn is a beautifully written and thoughtful work. I only stumbled upon it after reading a recent article in the NYT about the reading club Page Break; so glad I did. I'll look forward to more from Jordy Rosenberg.

[Sonia Roubini]

cackled my way through. so deeply hilarious and brilliantly written/reasoned, but also almost viscerally uncomfortable…

[Nicole · Rating 5 out of 5]

Barbara is kind of awful but I kind of love her. The tone of this entire novel is dark, poignant humor. It’s all kind of sadly hilarious. Barbara says and thinks things that I might think but immediately feel bad for thinking. She does not have that shame. It’s fascinating to read. The audiobook was incredibly well performed. Just fascinating and crazy and weird and dark. Really enjoyed it.

[Jeanie ~ Fables.and.fur · Rating 5 out of 5]

A flawed Jewish mother is dying and she is recounting her life. She has long since been estranged from her now adult child who is her caregiver.

We get all of our information from Barbara who is filled with disappointment in her family and how her life turned out. This of course is everyone else’s fault for not living up to her expectations. It’s impossible not to laugh at Barbara’s stories, opinions and musings. This is a compelling story and while you may or may not like Barbara, she’s certainly entertaining. The author’s narration is absolute perfection in the audiobook production. Because the narration is outstanding, get this one on audiobook if you can. There is a shocking revelation late in the story, so don’t read too many reviews as someone is sure to spill a spoiler. I’ll be thinking about Barbara and her family for some time. Brilliant and a must read.

[Jody · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rosenberg's talented for sure, but this just wasn't my thing.

[Venneh · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved Rosenberg's last book and was wondering. where he would go for his follow up. As it turns out, the answer is deep into the dying psyche of an elderly Jewish woman as she also reflects on the two great disappointments of her life: her estranged trans son and her ex best friend who betrayed her. Props to Rosenberg for also essentially doing a deep dive into the psyche of some of the worst TERF-adjacent bullshit that says that people like him shouldn't exist. The voice work is astounding here, and this has been one of my favorite reads of the last little while. Pick this up and enjoy the ride.