[Levy] is an indelible writer . . . [an] elliptical genius . . . The Cost of Living . . . is always a pleasure to consume.

Dwight Garner, The New York Times

An astute observer of both the mundane and the inexplicable, Levy sketches memorable details in just a few strokes . . . What makes the book stand out . . . is that Levy doesn't allow herself to linger over these details . . . She's like an expert rafter, and the river she travels is full of encounters and emotions. While another writer might give us a lengthy tour of this turbulent water, Levy doesn't slow down. There's joy in her maneuvering through the rapids, difficult though they may be. And there's joy for us in watching her.

Yiyun Lee, The New York Times Book Review

Levy's style is fragmented, each anecdote as luminous, self-contained and hard as the pearls in the necklace she habitually wears around her throat. There's humor here and vulnerability . . . The Cost of Living is a smart, slim meditation on womanhood informed by Levy's wide reading.

Maureen Corrigan, NPR's “Fresh Air”

The Cost of Living is unclassifiable, original, full of unexpected pleasures at every turn. Though it can be read in a flash, I suspect readers will want to savor this book slowly, for its many moments of insight, humor, wisdom, and surprise. Delivered in gorgeous, disciplined prose, Deborah Levy has crafted a bracing, searing inquiry into one woman's life that manages to tell the truth of all women's lives. I loved it.

Dani Shapiro

Levy would never tell another woman to live the way she does, or to live any one way at all. She's too sophisticated a feminist for that. Still, she wants us . . . to know that she's happy, that she's thriving in this new, uncharted life. Her work is, too. The last sentence of the book starts, 'The writing you are reading now is made from the cost of living.' For writing this good, the cost of living is plainly the right price to pay.

NPR.org

An eloquent manifesto for what Levy calls 'a new way of living' in the post-familial world.

The Guardian