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Publication: The New Yorker

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COPYRIGHT 2006 All rights reserved. Reproduced by permission of The Condé Nast Publications Inc.

Elements of Style, by Wendy Wasserstein (Knopf; $23.95). The playwright Wendy Wasserstein, who died earlier this year, had the rare ability to be sardonic and compassionate at once--a talent put to the test in this novel about the goofy attempts of Manhattan ladies who lunch to adapt to post-9/11 life. The Axis of Evil notwithstanding, the characters' lives continue to consist mainly of elaborate dances of social one-upmanship. The heroine, through whose eyes the other characters are satirized, is a well-groomed (Spence, Princeton) woman who, unlike her friends, is...

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