num_pages: 240
description: Fred G. Leebron's remarkable novel takes place in the chain-restaurant mecca of Charlotte, North Carolina, in a cramped, shabby house where Warner Lutz can't stop mulling over his rage and his many failures. His wife, Megan, tries to keep him smiling, but he lives up to his role as "the most negative person she'd ever met." Sometimes his two children cause glimmerings of life in his burned-out soul, but more often they are crying, soiling their pants, asking stupid questions over and over. For readers on the verge of entering marriage and family life, Six Figures could make even the most stoic turn and run in the other direction. The creeped-out hangover this novel leaves is a testament to Leebron's great powers. Like John Cheever, he makes you wonder if maybe the whole thing--putting kids to sleep, having dinner, lovemaking, trying to make enough money--isn't all somehow a slow and terminal act of violence. Warner loses it one Saturday morning, after drinking a double vodka for breakfast and helping his wife change their baby boy. While his daughter and wife look on, he gets to his knees and tries to squeeze himself into a space underneath the crib:  He was too thick to fit under the crib. He pulled out the activity blanket and tried again. The metal latticework hooked itself the length of the mattress. He poked at the white bedding. "I'm down here," he said. "Down here. Here."  Leebron has written one previous novel, Out West, and has won all the big prizes and taught at all the good workshops. For those in the literary world who wagered on him, Six Figures is proof that he was a good bet. It is a novel so quintessentially modern, and so carefully crafted that it's almost impossible to put down. This is not because Warner is a "likable" character (he's frequently detestable) or because a lot happens (aside from one terrible crime two thirds into the book, not much does). Six Figures succeeds because of the way rage seeps into the humdrum world Warner occupies; the way his little gripes build one upon another until they seem on the verge of killing him, or those around him. Leebron has written a book that runs over the reader like a tidal wave, even as his impeccable prose lulls you like a calm sea. --Emily White
language: English
title: Six Figures
titlecomplete: Six Figures
genres: Fiction
ratings_count: 97
publisher: Knopf