SOURCE: LeClair, Tom. “Brief Review.” New Republic 191, no. 3640 (22 October 1984): 46, 48.

In the following review of Free Agents, LeClair explores Apple's self-obsessed narrative manner.

Much of Max Apple's new collection could have been published in Me Magazine. There's Max growing up in the 1950s with a Yiddish-speaking grandmother in Grand Rapids, deserting his family and region, holding onto kosher food (“The American Bakery,” “Blood Relatives,” “Stranger at the Table”). From the “Me and Mine” section we have three stories: Max exploring fatherhood with children Jessica and Sam at Girl Scout meetings, in a “Pizza Time” restaurant, and on a Dallas movie set. In the “My Arts” department are “The Four Apples,” a piece about stories for kids, and “An Offering,” a fictional prospectus advertising shares in “Max Apple, Inc.,” producer of “private fantasies.” The title story, about Max Apple's organs' declaring independence from him, would be perfect for Me's...