We're not rich," I said. Leaving aside my stepson's inflated assessment of our family's circumstances, rich was a word for other people, and generally for those one doesn't like. "We're only doing okay. And be sure not to say anything like that around your uncle." I corrected with an eye roll, "Step-uncle." A searing, addictive novel about the power and limitations of food, family, success, and desire. Shriver examines America's weight obsession with both razor-sharp insight and compassion." - J. Courtney Sullivan She was about forty-five? The right age. Probably watched every season. It's a whole cohort, Panda Bear. They're not that old, and they're not all dead yet." Even more averse than I to playing up my Burbank connection, Fletcher changed the subject — turning to the one topic sure to fill out the rest of the meal: all that jazz. As I retrieved napkins at his side, Tanner muttered, "Look more like the beat down type to me." I hoped Edison hadn't heard him.

Step-uncle," Tanner corrected, standing at the counter getting toast crumbs on the floor. "Right next door to total stranger in my book. Sorry. Got plans."What's so cautionary about my grampa being a TV star?" I noted that in this instance Tanner had dropped the "step." I'm sure you're worn out after your trip," I said hastily, "but you may not be — comfortable in these chairs." I did a rapid inventory: the living room was furnished with Fletcher's rigid normal-size- person creations. But one broken-down recliner in the master bedroom was leftover from the days I lived alone; I'd refused to part with an ugly chair so sumptuous for curling up to read. My husband's confabulations of oak, cedar, and ash were more sensuous for the eye than the ass. Jesus, it's like he's trying to sound like a jazz musician," Tanner grumbled once Edison had shambled outside. "Like some stereotype of a jazz musician that wouldn't wash in a biopic because it's trite. You're not going to tell me, Pando, that he grew up speaking jive."

What would you do for love of a brother? For love of a husband? For love of food? In Big Brother, Shriver's new and wonderfully timely novel, her heroine wrestles with these vexing questions. Only the scales don't lie." - Margot LiveseyLittle cheesy, though," Edison proclaimed from his new throne, and drained the last of his beer. "That rag's gone to shit. One step from Entertainment Weekly." It shouldn't have taken me so long to realize that Edison might have regarded that cover as an invasion of sorts. New York was his patch. No prob — smells great!" Edison helped himself to a large nearby jar of peanuts and asked for a beer. I poured him a lager and followed him anxiously to the table. Fletcher had made the dining set, and the chairs all had finely curved arms — between which my brother was not going to fit. The characterization stung. "Edison has a son somewhere, but his ex got full custody when the boy was a baby. So your uncle doesn't have much experience talking to kids — " I'm not dissing Wynton Marsalis," Edison was opining. "He's brought in some bread, if nothing else. But the trouble with Wynton is he feeds this whole nostalgia thing, like jazz is over, you hear what I'm sayin'? Like it's in a museum, under glass. Nothing wrong with keeping the standards alive, so long as you don't turn the whole field into one big snoring PBS doc. 'Cause it's still evolving, dig? I mean, you got a certain amount of lost free crap, which the public hates, and drives what few folks do listen to jazz even further into the ass of the past. Cats who blow all freaky don't appreciate that even Ornette riffed on an underlying structure. But other Post-Bop cats out there are killing. Even some of Miles's contemporaries are still playing, still innovating: Sonny, Wayne ..." I tried to be offhand about it. Turning off the ratatouille, Fletcher was stoic, Cody eager to help. Once upstairs, my husband and I finally met each other's eyes. Desperate to talk to him for hours, I could only shake my head in dismay.