Better Homes & Husbands: A Novel

Valerie Ann Leff

Jun 2005 · Sold by St. Martin's Press

About this ebook

980 Park, a fictional, pre-war co-op on the Northwest corner of Park Avenue and 83rd Street, houses the rich and famous-Sidney Sapphire, the blonde anchorwoman of ABC News, Angela Somoza, the gorgeous Nicaraguan jet-setter, Bob Horowitz, the former chairman of the United Jewish Appeals, and the usual collection of banking and industrial CEO's, Wall Street magnates, and white-haired philanthropists. The Brooklyn-born doorman, Vinnie Ferretti, joins the ranks when he becomes a major fashion designer.

The building's board, rich as clotted cream, sips gin in the afternoons and devises ways to keep out anyone deemed "inappropriate." Stifled resentments come to a head when the French baroness in the penthouse dies, and two Jewish families in the building suspect the co-op board of more discrimination with regard to prospective buyers than might be legal.

Better Homes and Husbands is a stylish, richly woven novel about class and caste feuds, played out with ferocity and etiquette in a posh New York apartment building during the tumultuous period of social change between 1970 and 2000.

About the author

Valerie Ann Leff is co-director of the Great Smokies Writing Program at the University of North Carolina, Asheville. Portions of this novel have appeared in The Antioch Review, Chelsea, Lilith, and the South Carolina Review.