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" TOM PERROTTA, author of the novel Election (yup, the one that became the Alexander Payne movie), is a shrewd observer of toddler politics. But the kids in his new book, Little Children (St. Martin&amp;#039;s, $25), are less inspiration for the novel&amp;#039;s title than a burden for the adults in the book to schlepp around. Or worse: One of the main characters in this novel bearing so seemingly innocuous a name is, well, a sex offender.  But Little Children is much more than just a tale of felony exhibitionism. It&amp;#039;s the story of a mottled group of suburban parents in various states of dissatisfaction with their variously suburban lives. To wit: Todd and Sarah are house spouses eager for an extramarital affair with each other. Mary Ann schedules her sex life with pre-TiVo rigidity. Larry, the discharged cop, is hell-bent on harassing Ronnie, the sex offender.  Through all of this, Perrotta wisely refuses to condescend to the world he satirizes, and his masterful perspective-hopping provides the reader with a breezy omniscience over the characters&amp;#039; failures in life. The book is disarmingly funny but rueful; Perrotta handles his fictive offspring in just the same way Todd gazes at his deceived wife--not mockingly, but with &amp;quot;something sweeter and more complicated.&amp;quot; And above all else, the book&amp;#039;s screenplay speed makes it infinitely readable. Little Children is a brave novel about the ugly by-products of lives spent seeking a vanilla balance of leisure and structure. In the absence of a great social novel with something new to say about the horror, the horror, we could do worse than settle for Perrotta&amp;#039;s engrossing, compassionate gossip. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/books/reviews/a2623/esq0404-apr-bigbook/>