Maybe in Missoula

With a quirky sensibility reminiscent of Anne Tyler's, the author of Montana Women returns to her native state for a second novel that explores a woman's relationship with her husband and his brother. In her early 30s, Annie is tired of sex with her straightlaced husband, Morton, the owner of a furniture store. Why, she wonders, don't the women's magazines publish articles like ``How to Tell Him You Hate It and Why''? She does tell him, in the nicest possible way, that she's quitting sex; a divorce ensues, after which Annie and Sammy, her 12-year-old son, move to Missoula. There they encounter Paul, Annie's first love and Morton's brother, who may also be Sammy's real father. The author deals her cards face-up, with little suspense in the way the story unfolds, but there is much that's wonderful in her rendering of the tricky, constantly shifting nature of relationships over time. Occasional passages from the viewpoint of Morton or Paul provide intriguing contrast to Annie's own perceptions, and the past is a tangible presence in the recollections of the three main characters, as well as in scenes with their elderly parents. Marred only by a somewhat puzzling, anticlimactic ending, the novel is an earthy, humorous rendering of a woman's attempts to establish an identity in the world, even as she reaches for new ways to understand her parents, child and lovers past and present. (May)