The pain of breaking up with the person "who was the one" is told in a humorous conversational style with an obvious female point-of-view. The result is a very witty and at times acerbic dialogue which is very often rife with an over-abundance of cloying self-pity. The Old-Cow/New-Cow Theory is compelling in both its practical application as salve for deeply-etched wounds and as the underlying theme that unifies this first novel.

Jane Goodall is a thirty-year-old living in New York City and working for a demanding late-night talk-show host as a booking agent. Her break-up with Ray, and her subsequent living arrangements with Eddie, her womanizing coworker, gives her the necessary material to synthesize as she tries to figure out why men dump women, and more specifically why Ray dumped her. Real excerpts from articles on animal husbandry, narcissism, and other various psychological theories precede each chapter and adds veracity to Jane's suppositions, as well as great doses of irony.

There is a lot of whining, but it is very funny whining. Even though I grew a little tired of Jane's angst, I sympathized and truly rooted for her to overcome the burden of Ray's rejection. Anyone ever treated like a discarded piece of baggage will truly appreciate Jane's small victories of comprehension as she traces the dubious motivations men may have to move on to that next conquest and to break one more heart.

Leane M. Ellis, March 24, 1998.