Rockville Pike: A Suburban Comedy of Manners

Jane Kramer never imagined a life selling discount furniture and commuting between grocery stores and soccer fields via minivan. But when her father-in-law has a heart attack, she and her husband, Leon, trade in their glamorous New York life for a stint running the family business on Rockville Pike, a tributary of the suburban sprawl line extending outward from Washington, D.C. Kramer's Discount Furniture Depot sits away from several lanes of traffic, near the tombstone of Zelda and F. Scott Fitzgerald. It is here that Jane escapes each day at lunchtime to ponder her confusing turn in life.

At age forty-one, she has a teenage Goth son, her husband is increasingly overweight and quick-tempered, and their business is in a state of crisis, both financially and legally. Jane finds herself wishing for something more. First, add to the mix Delia, a mysterious and strangely predatory patio-furniture saleswoman who seems to have her sights set on Leon, and then an attack on the store expansion plans by historic preservationists. When potentially disturbing findings about Delia's past come to light, Jane finds herself learning that, despite life's reversals, it is possible to reinvent herself by tapping into talents and desires she didn't realize she still had.

Rockville Pike is a smart, witty, and funny read that revels in the joy of discovering what life has in store.

"Coll ( ) considers one woman's stalled life and the midlife crisis it provokes in her funny, poignant second novel. In ber-suburban Rockville Pike, Md., 41-year-old Jane Kramer is stuck running Kramer's Discount Furniture Depot, raising her teenage goth son, Justin, virtually alone and obsessing over Delia, the patio furniture saleswoman who's vying for her husband Leon's attentions. Highlights, for Jane, are her daily visits to the grave sites of Zelda and F. Scott Fitzgerald, her creative shopping sprees, and her discovery of Memories Inc., a pyramid scheme that thrives on the scrapbooking obsessions of housewives. All's semiwell, at least, until Leon runs off with Delia, Justin gets suspended from school and Jane realizes that they are living way beyond their means. Pushed to the breaking point, Jane thinks of her mother, a suicide: 'Another reason why I couldn't drive my van off a cliff was because there was a load of wet towels in the washer and who would ever think to stick them in the dryer?' Propelling herself out of her inertia, Jane decides to track down her misbehaving family, and soon she finds herself back in New York, where she first met Leon, mourning the life she never lived and determined to fix the life she never planned. Coll perfectly captures Jane's coming of a certain age with feisty humor and soul-searching honesty. Agent, Melanie Jackson. (Jan.)" Publishers Weekly (Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information, Inc.)

From the acclaimed author of "karlmarx.com" comes the hilarious, offbeat story of an unfulfilled housewife who regains her sanity and identity amidst the wackiness of everyday life.