Ellington Boulevard: A Novel in A-Flat

An apartment on West 106th Street (aka Ellington Boulevard) links a disparate group of New Yorkers in this intricate tale of life, love and real estate. Ike Morphy, a rent-controlled tenant at 84 West 106th Street, learns his apartment is being sold by hard-luck magnet Mark Masler, who, after inheriting the building from his deceased real estate developer father, learns Ike never signed a legal lease. Ike isn't happy about giving up the cheap digs so close to Central Park, where he walks his adopted pooch, Herbie Mann. (Herbie has his own history with the ensemble that swirls around the apartment.) Columbia “veteran teaching assistant” Darrell Schiff and his ambitious magazine editor wife, Rebecca Sugarman, meanwhile, are looking to move out of their cramped student housing apartment and into somewhere with enough space for “an as-yet-unconceived child.” Their broker, part-time actor Josh Dybnick, is hot to make a commission that'll put him closer to his dream of opening his own theater. Langer (Crossing California ; The Washington Story ) takes his time in developing the characters and the depths of their interconnectedness, rendering the twists, doubts and heartbreaks that afflict the milieu highly affecting. For readers who turn first on Sunday morning to the real estate section, it doesn't get much better. (Jan.)