Somethin' Extra

At the outset of this debut novel, Rice comes on like a cynical Terry McMillan who's determined to make her contribution to the all-men-are-dogs school of literature. Genie Gatlin, 25, having determined that men are only good for two things (money and sex), dates exclusively married guys to avoid the hassles of love and commitment. She pedantically and, as it turns out, only partially explains the not-so-subtle psychological underpinnings of her heart's exile: her father fooled around on her mother, who died of heartbreak. Meanwhile, David Lewis, a 52-year-old former Atlanta newspaper editor, has been transplanted to Maryland because his wife, Monica, has landed a new high-powered job in Washington, D.C., and he's feeling lonely and neglected. When he starts teaching at a Maryland university and meets the English department's new secretary, Genie, the May-November affair blossoms. Genie is terrified of loving the professor, realizing that ""David is much more to me than an open wallet and zipper,"" and while David says heartwarming things to her like, ""I idolize you, babe,"" he still loves his wife. Genie's journey beyond shallowness takes her to a painful reckoning with the terrible secret of her childhood. Rice clearly delineates her protagonist's struggle, but readers may not be sympathetic. Genie is whiny and self-obsessed, her nonstop flippant diatribes registering petty complaints about small penises, lying men and most tiresomely, ""that love shit."" When Genie becomes so unbearable that even her friends despair, and no one, not even she, can justify her behavior, the reader may suspect that her tale is a cautionary one, but this knowledge comes too late. Readers will be exasperated before David gets his priorities straight and Genie finally decides to take charge of her life.(Jan.)