Word: hoffmans
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SEVENTH HEAVEN by Alice Hoffman; Putnam; 256 pages...
...eighth and by far best book, Alice Hoffman creates characters so true to their moment in time that future generations trying to reproduce life in a Long Island suburb in 1959 could use this as a blueprint. Hoffman introduces us to Nora Silk as she is moving into a little box of a home, so much like the others "that children wandered into the wrong house for cookies and milk." Her feckless husband, a magician who cannot even get hired for children's birthday parties, has left her and fled to Las Vegas, where he hopes to perfect his lounge...
...Hoffman is also able to bring to life a complex supporting cast of characters in a few swift paragraphs. They travel from open hostility toward this stranger, to liking her despite her imperfections, to loving her because of them. The most complacent wife discovers that love can disappear, not overnight but in the course of a hundred tuna casseroles served every Friday. No one is immune from dissatisfaction and its companion, desire, which can be tamped down but comes back unannounced. "You might find it when you slipped your hand into a rubber glove to scour the kitchen sink...
...Hoffman avoids the easy sentimentality of her last book, At Risk, the story of an 11-year-old who contracts AIDS through a blood transfusion. In Seventh Heaven, when a young girl dies accidentally after a group of high school boys cruelly take advantage of her, the sorrow does not really hit until a classmate cleaning out her parents' garage discovers the notebook she kept of each day's outfits and accessories, and a box of matching shoes, all shined...
...stars-and-stripes sweater sold out last fall, Ralph Lauren created three-spangled swimsuits that are moving briskly at up to $72. Saks Fifth Avenue's New Glory shirt ($57.50) sold out just in time for the Fourth of July. The shirt's success might have surprised Abbie Hoffman. The late yippie was once charged with flag desecration for wearing a shirt like Saks' best seller...