Big Babies

In this hilarious novel from the author of Diminished Capacity, narrator A.J. Fleger writes a letter to his biological mother describing his madcap adventures with his adopted brother, Sterling. A.J. quickly covers his less than idyllic childhood with a volatile father and Sterling, with whom he shares a love of television and classic movies. A.J. is a fairly aimless youth, but Sterling is determined to be an actor and so jumps at the chance to appear on a late-night comic skit program called Manhattan Live. Unfortunately, he flubs his big line and slinks away to live in obscurity. This is the frantically funny story of how the Fleger brothers evolve from that point to the one hinted at in the opening pages of the letter: ""You don't know Sterling, but you may have seen him last week on CNN. He's the guy who went flying over the Las Vegas Strip on New Year's Eve in the Little Spudge-Face Baby Safety Suit and got shot by his biological brother."" A.J. meets his future wife at a meeting of Public Setback Support, a 12 step-type program for people who have made major mistakes in public. He later falls into a career in the baby-proofing business, selling protective gear like helmets for tots. Sterling has a role in a reenactment on the television show Open Cases, in which he plays the part of a man who committed a shoot-out in a library, and later is arrested when his neighbors--obviously not grasping the reenactment concept--call the show's 800 number and turn him in. Kiraly's latest is a brilliant satire, packed with coincidences and wry observations about contemporary American culture. (Nov.)