"Hysterically funny, beautifully written. . . . Warming and endearing, brilliant."-Anne Tyler, New Republic After four years of college in New England, Louise Brown is back in New Orleans, steeped in society's "wastrel-youth contingent" yet somewhat detached, observing it all. From one lush, sweltering event to another, Violent Love, Breakdowns, Moods, laconic speech, and drunkenness reign, inscribing the South's hallmarks of defeat and refuge in a group of people as intense and adrift as one could encounter. At the center (in Louise's eyes) is Claude Collier, rumpled, accident prone,...