num_pages: 336
description: Elements of Style , the Pulitzer Prize—winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein’s first novel, is a scathing comedy about New York's high society facing the post—9/11 world. Francesca Weissman, an Upper East Side pediatrician rated number one by Manhattan magazine, floats on the fringes of the upper strata of privilege and aspiration. Through her bemused eyes we meet the thoroughbred socialite Samantha Acton; relentless social climber Judy Tremont; Barry Santorini, an Oscar-winning moviemaker accustomed to having his way; his supermarket heiress wife, Clarice; and more, tossed together in a frothy stew of outrageous conspicuous consumption and adulterous affairs that play out on Page Six. But when Wasserstein’s madcap tour of the social lives and mores of twenty-first-century Manhattan veers into tragedy, we finally see the true cost of her characters’ choices, and the beating heart of this dazzling novel.
language: English
title: Elements of Style
titlecomplete: Elements of Style
characters: Francesca Weissman, Charlie Acton, Clarice Santorini, Jil Taillou, Samantha Acton, Judy Tremont
genres: American, New York, Adult, Chick Lit, Humor, Novels, Audiobook, Literature, Contemporary, Fiction
ratings_count: 1577
places: New York City, New York
publisher: Vintage