Suburban Angst

When The Stories of John Cheever was originally published, it became an immediate national bestseller and won the Pulitzer Prize. In the years since, it has become a classic. Vintage Books is proud to reintroduce this magnificent collection.
Here are sixty-one stories that chronicle the lives of what has been called "the greatest generation." From the early wonder and disillusionment of city life in "The Enormous Radio" to the surprising discoveries and common mysteries of suburbia in "The Housebreaker of Shady Hill" and "The Swimmer," Cheever tells us everything we need to know about "the pain and sweetness of life."

Bestselling author Connell is expert at sketching the banalities and trivialities of middle-class values, customs, and habits. Like "Mr. Bridge," its counterpart, "Mrs. Bridge" is comprised of over 100 titled chapters, containing vignettes, an image, a fragment of conversation, an event--all building powerfully toward the completed group portrait of a family.

Juxtaposing the most common and the most gothic, the humorous and the tragic, author Jeffrey Eugenides creates a vivid and compelling portrait of youth and lost innocence. He takes us back to the elm-lined streets of suburbia in the seventies, and introduces us to the men whose lives have been forever changed by their fierce, awkward obsession with five doomed sisters: brainy Therese, fastidious Mary, ascetic Bonnie, libertine Lux, and pale, saintly Cecilia, whose spectacular demise inaugurates "the year of the suicides". This is the debut novel that caused a sensation and won immediate acclaim from the critics -- a tender, wickedly funny tale of love and terror, sex and suicide, memory and imagination.

The Pulitzer-Prize Winning novel for 1996.

A comic, tragic masterpiece of an American family breaking down in an age of easy fixes, Franzen's third novel brings an old-time America into wild collision with the era of home surveillance and New Economy speculation. Winner of the National Book Award.

5 stars

Published to overwhelming critical acclaim, this extraordinary collection of short stories established A. M. Homes as one of the most provocative and daring writers of her generation. Here you'll find the cult classic "A Real Doll," the tale of a teenage boy's erotic obsession with his sister's favorite doll; "Adults Alone," which first introduced Paul and Elaine, the crack-smoking yuppie couple whose marriage careens out of control in Homes's novel "Music for Torching;" and "Looking for Johnny," in which a kidnapped boy, having failed his abductor's expectations, is returned home.

Brilliantly conceived, sharply etched, and exceptionally satisfying, these stories explore the American dream in ways you're not likely soon to forget. Working in Kodacolor hues, Homes offers an uncanny picture of a surreal suburbia-outrageous and utterly b

Lee's third novel (after "Native Speaker" and "A Gesture Life") "approaches the problems of race and belonging in America from a new angle--the perspective of Jerry Battle, the semiretired patriarch of a well-off (and mostly white) Long Island family" ("Publishers Weekly").

Since the 1922 publication of "Babbitt," its eponymous anti-hero--a real estate broker and relentless social climber inhabiting a Midwestern town called Zenith--has become a symbol of stultifying values and middle-class hypocrisy. Revised reissue.

On the occasion of the paperback release of Demonology, Back Bay Books takes pleasure in making all four of Rick Moody's acclaimed earlier works of fiction available in handsome new paperback editions.

A twentieth-century classic, Appointment in Samarra" is the first and most widely read book by the writer Fran Leibowitz called "the real F. Scott Fitzgerald."
In December 1930, just before Christmas, the Gibbsville social circuit is electrified with parties and dances, where the music plays late into the night and the liquor flows freely. At the center of the social elite stand Julian and Caroline English--the envy of friends and strangers alike. But in one rash moment born inside a highball glass, Julian breaks with polite society and begins a rapid descent toward self-destruction. Appointment in Samarra" brilliantly captures the personal politics and easy bitterness of small-town life. It is John O'Hara's crowning achievement, and a lasting testament to the keen social intelligence of a major American novelist.

A BookPage Notable Title
"Tom Perrotta . . . is like an American Nick Hornby: companionable and humane, lighthearted and surprisingly touching."--"Newsweek." "An absorbing, fleshed-out portrait of an American male edging toward adulthood by crossing seemingly rigid social boundaries. . . An overwhelmingly pleasing book."--"The New York Times."

This exquisite, resonant novel is a brilliant portrait of marriage by a contemporary American master. Even as he lingers over the lustrous surface of Viri and Nedra's marriage, James Salter makes us see the cracks that are spreading through it, flaws that will in time mar it beyond repair. "An unexpectedly moving ode to beautiful lives frayed by time."

This "richly appointed and generously portrayed" ("Kirkus Reviews") debut novel tells the story of a Waspy, old-Boston family coming face to face with an America much larger than the one it was born in.

The luminous novella and stories in The Age of Grief" explore the vicissitudes of love, friendship, and marriage with all the compassion and insight that have come to be expected from Jane Smiley, the Pulitzer Prize--winning author of A Thousand Acres."
In "The Pleasure of Her Company," a lonely, single woman befriends the married couple next door, hoping to learn the secret of their happiness. In "Long Distance," a man finds himself relieved of the obligation to continue an affair that is no longer compelling to him, only to be waylaid by the guilt he feels at his easy escape. And in the incandescently wise and moving title novella, a dentist, aware that his wife has fallen in love with someone else, must comfort her when she is spurned, while maintaining the secret of his own complicated sorrow. Beautifully written, with a wry intel

From the inimitable Anne Tyler, a rich and compelling novel about a mismatched marriage--and its consequences, spanning three generations.
They seemed like the perfect couple--young, good-looking, made for each other. The moment Pauline, a stranger to the Polish Eastern Avenue neighborhood of Baltimore (though she lived only twenty minutes away), walked into his mother's grocery store, Michael was smitten. And in the heat of World War II fervor, they are propelled into a hasty wedding. But they never should have married.
Pauline, impulsive, impractical, tumbles hit-or-miss through life; Michael, plodding, cautious, judgmental, proceeds deliberately. While other young marrieds, equally ignorant at the start, seemed to grow more seasoned, Pauline and Michael remain amateurs. In time their foolish quarrels take their toll. Even when

Harry Angstrom was a star basketball player in high school and that was the best time of his life. Now in his mid-20s, his work is unfulfilling, his marriage is moribund, and he tries to find happiness with another woman. But happiness is more elusive than a medal, and Harry must continue to run--from his wife, his life, and from himself, until he reaches the end of the road and has to turn back....

With a new introduction by Richard Ford
"A deft, ironic, beautiful novel that deserves to be a classic." --William Styron
From the moment of its publication in 1961, Revolutionary Road was hailed as a masterpiece of realistic fiction and as the most evocative portrayal of the opulent desolation of the American suburbs. It's the story of Frank and April Wheeler, a bright, beautiful, and talented couple who have lived on the assumption that greatness is only just around the corner. With heartbreaking compassion and remorseless clarity, Richard Yates shows how Frank and April mortgage their spiritual birthright, betraying not only each other, but their best selves.
In his introduction to this edition, novelist Richard Ford pays homage to the lasting influence and enduring power of Revolutionary Road.