PLAYGROUNDS

by Alan Gelb ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 14, 1987

Gelb (Columbus A venue, 1984) continues his tales of Manhattan's Upper West Side with this swollen, mawkish story about baby boomers who are parents themselves in the gentrified 80's. You practically need a scorecard to tell all the architects, brokers, editors, freelance writers, and lawyers apart (not to mention their children, the fluffy-haired, cute-as-a-bug Aarons and Mollys and Davids and Hildys), but these are not Yuppies here--these are 60's people in their 30s and early 40s who have gotten serious and well-to-do and who are really into their children. The action centers around a neighborhood day-care center run by bossy earth-mother Loretta and her assistants, love-starved Katrina, and Charles, a 60's activist still underground. Among the couples whose lives intertwine through the Center are Bill and Louise, whose marriage is breaking up because Louise (""I need space. I need time"") has realized that Bill is a real dud. There's also Sam the writer and househusband, who is getting it on with housewife Nancy, while their respective spouses bring home the bacon. Also appearing are Anna and Michael, who starred in Columbus Avenue; they're just as unbelievable as ever, but now also a little pathetic, since Anna has breast cancer. What evolves is a kind of gentrified Couples, but without the socko sex or humor. Bill and Louise eventually get back together after a crazed Center employee steals one of their kids (the child is recovered); Nancy dumps her husband (and also hapless Sam, who returns to his wife); and Anna has a mastectomy while Michael copes. At the close, Loretta is pregnant by Charles (who disappears)--Katrina and Loretta will raise the baby together. The Upper West Side is certainly here in all its real-estate developer's glory. But its insular, super-serious inhabitants make for both long-winded and pretentious storytelling.

Pub Date: May 14, 1987

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Putnam

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1987

Categories: FICTION