Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?

The reason Nicole wonders if Barron will still love her tomorrow is that he's married--but not to her. Nicole, tired of this loose end, has just given him an ultimatum of sorts (``I'm living out your dream, but this is my real life''), and the rest of Stein's ( Her Only Sin ) third novel is the story of how Nicole and Barron got into such a mess. Nicole was the high-school ``teenage queen'' of Jonesboro, Tenn., who wanted to make it in the big city. After she finally wins a coveted job in an L.A. ad agency, she loses it when her boss dies. Unable to find another position, she turns to alcohol and drugs. Meanwhile, Barron, ``the man on the cover of Forbes ,'' is becoming one of America's richest men. But his wife, who stood by him in the lean years, feels unappreciated and resentful--and she becomes an alcoholic. Nicole and Barron meet at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, he offers her a job at his aviation company, and a romance ensues. Stein makes this relationship between two nice though ordinary people seem fresh despite lapses into fussy prose and the overlay of AA psychology in the lovers' dialogue. He offsets the love-talk with a witty, acute take on L.A. life in the '80s. (Apr.)