Adulthood weighs heavily on the shoulders of well-heeled British marrieds with children in these 11 new stories by Simpson (Dear George
), who extracts gentle pathos and humor from her aging characters as they despair of their narrowing futures. To a group of lithe young teens eavesdropping on an English couple with a new baby at a Mediterranean resort, the ghastly emotional neediness and flabby bodies of the adults seem grotesque and frightening. In "Every Third Thought," a mother of three daughters bemoans the unrelenting news of sickness among her friends—until a bus hits her (the story continues). Anxiety about the loss of romance and vitality leeches into "If I'm Spared," about a philandering husband who ceases his cheating to get treatment for lung cancer. There's a steadiness throughout, as when Simpson records the attachment of Zoe to her third and last child during their daily drive to school in "Early One Morning." The meandering last story, "Constitutional," is a meditation on mortality and memory that's literally a walk in the park, and it beautifully showcases Simpson's limpid prose and unforced deductions. (May)
