Known as a comic writer whose satirical portraits of regions and decades, especially the 1970s, Alther explores manners and mores both in high culture and rural life. Her intricately interwoven plots and character sketches bring together beautiful people and bumpkins to create a comedy of manners which explores each character's search for validation, however misguided it may seem. Her central concern is the web of bonds and mores which connect individuals in families, friendships, and communities.
The novel's focus on the nearly twenty-year-old friendship between two women places human relationships, especially women's friendship, as a central concern. Marriage and family, too, are central, as the partnerships between Turner and Clea and Terence and Elke are explored, exploded, and redefined. Since these four characters are all at midlife and middle age, with children gone from the.....
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