From her well-remembered New Yorker essays about the financial demands of big-city ambition and the ethereal, strangely old-fashioned allure of cyber relationships to her dazzlingly hilarious riff in Harper's about musical passions that give way to middle-brow paraphernalia, Daum delves into the center of things while closely examining the detritus that spills out along the way. She speaks to questions at the root of the contemporary experience, from the search for authenticity and interpersonal connection in a society defined by consumerism and media; to the disenchantment of working in a "glamour profession"; to the catastrophic effects of living among New York City's terminal hipsters.

Machine generated contents note: -- Foreword 7 -- On the Fringes of the Physical World 13 -- Publishing and Other Near-Death Experiences 31 -- My Misspent Youth 39 -- Carpet Is Mungers 61 -- Inside the Tube 69 -- Toy Children 95 -- According to the Women I'm Fairly Pretty 103 -- American Shiksa 125 -- Music Is My Bag 135 -- Variations on Grief 153.