Want Not

This ambitious, if somewhat overlong second novel from Miles (Dear American Airlines) concerns the tribulations of three very different, but interconnected, families in the New York City metropolitan area, beginning during Thanksgiving weekend 2007. Talmadge Bertrand and Micah Rye are “freegan” squatters in downtown Manhattan, subsisting on what they collect from dumpsters. After Micah becomes pregnant, Talmadge begins questioning whether their lifestyle is suited to raising a child. Elwin Cross Jr., a middle-aged linguistics professor living in suburban New Jersey, has recently been left by his wife, Maura, for one of her publicity clients. Distraction from his troubles comes from an offer to consult on a contentious government panel studying the safe, long-term disposal of radioactive waste. Forty-something mother and part-time actress Sara Masoli struggles with her husband Brian’s tragic death in the 9/11 attacks, while raising her headstrong teenage daughter, Alexis. Sara’s current husband, the smart but immature Dave, runs a profitable, shady debt-collection agency. Though an excess of backstory and character detail sometimes slows the book’s pace, mordant humor and a well-constructed plot manage to hold together Miles’s sophomore effort. Agent: Sloan Harris, ICM. (Nov.)