har-de-har

This new book gives you more of that, with much broad comedy and fine nuance, plus beauty in the despair and also something called “DESPAIR”—one of those patented har-de-har acronyms the novelist cannot even bother to pretend to try resisting—the “Disgruntled Employee Simulation Program for Audit Information and Review.”

She is chaperoned by a stepmom figure with a medical degree and a British accent—and by nebbishy Aaron, a fellow sketched with a livelier hand than many of other characters here, despite his burden of har-de-har gags in search of lost time.