Just-about-perfect novel: This book from 1980 is startlingly fresh. If we adjust the dollar amounts for book contracts to today's values, and concede that one character might have started the SUV craze, it is absolutely contemporary.The book's insistence on Manhattan Island as the center of the universe would be annoying to non-New Yorkers. This is unfortunate, since the characters are mostly from outside Manhattan (as is the author) and their interaction doesn't depend at all on their location. If the reader is able to deal with the Manhattan smugness, he will be amply rewarded with a plot and a cast of characters as perfectly drawn as any by Eric Ambler, in addition to a sly sense of humor which builds imperceptibly to a perfectly hilarious conclusion. Trillin almost could have dispensed altogether with his lovely plot, as his characters could carry most novels all by themselves. In addition to being a just-about-perfect exposition of the writer's craft, this book is also laugh-out-loud funny, literally.