In the Family Way: An Urban Comedy

Schwartz breaks out of type in this hilarious chronicle of the lives and loves of an unusual ""extended family"" on New York's Upper West Side. The narrative takes on the flavor of a Woody Allen film or an intelligent sitcom as it exposes the unsettled morals and mores of sophisticated, liberal urbanites. Roy, a good-natured and hedonistic middle-aged psychotherapist, and his ex-wife Bea, a caterer who helps run the building her mother owns near Central Park West, head a formidable cast of characters who, while ""all seeking happiness, naturally,"" occasionally transgress such social conventions as monogamy. Bea, who believes that ""keeping the family together is more important than sexual jealousy,"" accepts almost any configuration brought about by the fulfillment of desire, as long as the parties involved remain close to her, preferably in apartments within her building. The relatives and lovers in Bea's circle include Roy's second wife, Serena, who becomes the lesbian lover of Bea's artist sister, May; youthful Lisa, Roy's third wife; Dmitri, an expatriate Russian who is Bea's lover and the building's superintendent; Bea's mother, Anna, a slightly senile but still randy widow; and Bea and Roy's four children (two from Roy's wartime liaison with a Vietnamese prostitute) and their romantic interests. Schwartz (Ruined by Reading; Leaving Brooklyn) masterfully orchestrates, providing enough outrageous situations and ironic twists to keep the reader chuckling appreciatively throughout. Roy, for instance, agrees to impregnate ex-wife Serena so that she and May can raise a child. Finally, Roy must ask himself whether he is at the center of his own cherished ""harem,"" or whether he is just a link in the growing network of women and mothers surrounding him, the most powerful and taxed of whom is Bea, trying ""to hold back entropy single-handed."" Agent, Peter Matson. (Oct.)