The town numbers around 30,000 and is the home of Smith College. Like many small towns, it has had its economic ups and downs, recently more up, with boutiques and yuppification. As in most Kidder efforts, there is a personalizing factor. Unlike many boys who fantasize that life, Tommy pursued it and achieved it. He is the key to the city, knowing well its characters.
Characters there are.
Drugs have made their mark on hometown America with Frankie, who sometimes does undercover purchases for the police department, but who also wants to sample the wares. There's Rick, Tommy's childhood friend, who is also a cop, but who is devastated by a charge of child molesting. There's Laura Baumeister, the student of ability but on food stamps, which she collects with young son in tow while trying to memorize her T.S. Eliot. Through it all, Kidder keeps a deft hold on all the threads of narrative. He manages to tell his readers much about each of these people without trying to make a melodramatic case of hometown angst, seamy underbelly and urban woes.