Like much of Roth's fiction, Zuckerman Unbound confronts the tenuous relationship between an author and his creations.

[1] In Roth's novel, Herb Stempel and Charles Van Doren—played in the Redford film by, respectively, John Turturro and Ralph Fiennes—are called Alvin Pepler and Hewlett Lincoln.

The first and last books in the initial Zuckerman trilogy are 1979's The Ghost Writer and 1983's The Anatomy Lesson.

Critic John Lahr, in New York Magazine, called the novel "fascinating.

"[2] In The New Yorker, John Updike remarked, "Always one of the most intelligent and energetic of American writers, he has now become one of the most scrupulous.