High Maintenance » (FIRST)

Jennifer Belle is the national bestselling author of Going Down, High Maintenance, and the children's book Animal Stackers. Her work has appeared in the New York Times Magazine, the New York Observer, Harper's Bazaar, and Ms.

"High Maintenance is set in the manic world of Manhattan real estate, it tells the story of Liv Kellerman, freshly independent, having just left her husband and - more sadly - their fabulous duplex apartment with its Empire State Building views. On her own for the first time in her life, Liv relocates to a crumbling Greenwich Village hovel and contemplates her next move." "After an ill-starred stint as a reader for a blind judge, Liv stumbles into her true calling: selling real estate. With her native eye for prime properties and an effective blend of empathy and contempt for her clients, Liv finds success and soon is swimming with the sharks - hardcore brokers who'll do absolutely anything to close a deal. Along the way she picks up a maniacally ardent architect who likes to bite her, a lovesick androgynous mentor, strange and exasperating clients, and a gun, and brings them along on her search for the one thing she's really after - a home."--BOOK JACKET.

Library Journal

This work continues in the same tradition of Belle's highly praised first novel, Going Down (LJ 5/1/96), with equal parts hilarity and pain. Liv Kellerman has just left her husband after discovering his philandering. Never having been on her own before, she embarks on a new career in real estate. This novel is all New York from its high-priced apartments to its quirky characters. Liv begins dating an obsessive architect who likes to bite her. She finds a gun in a bathroom and keeps it, using it to scare aforementioned boyfriend when he turns out to be a liar and a cheat. Adjusting to a Greenwich Village dump after living in a penthouse, Liv shows fabulous apartments to clients who can't decide whether or not to buy them. Belle's portrayal of Liv's ups and downs, successes and failures are in turn funny and poignant. Interspersed are laugh-aloud lines: "When I got home I got undressed and a single pea fell out of my bra. I had gone to work with a pea in my bra and not even known it. Some princess, I thought." The film rights to Belle's first novel were optioned by Madonna; this one should have equal success. Highly recommended. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 1/01.] Kathy Ingels Helmond, Indianapolis-Marion Cty. P.L. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.