'American Wife' by Curtis Sittenfeld

What Sittenfeld, like so many American women, loves about Bush is her seemingly effortless ability to be herself. Indeed, so strong is Sittenfeld's attachment that her new novel, "American Wife," she says, is based on the life of her favorite first lady.

"American Wife" reveals how difficult it can be, living this American life with its dreams of power and prosperity, to be true to yourself -- an enduring and fruitful theme in our national literature.

As in Sittenfeld's two other novels, "Prep" and "The Man of My Dreams," the protagonist here, Alice Lindgren, is an outsider who finds herself on a fast track. In all three books, Sittenfeld creates women who must sell pieces of their souls to maintain their "good girl status."

They do their duty as daughters, wives and mothers. It's a duty defined by our moralizing culture, with slight variations neighborhood by neighborhood, mall by mall.

Alice is a nice Lutheran girl. She has modest aspirations, good grades and loving parents. Even Charlie Blackwell, scion of a big, old wealthy Republican family, says she's "ideal wife material."

In some circles, this is the highest praise imaginable.

But being human means being vulnerable. Alice's vulnerability rears its head when she is 17. The year is 1963, which is, of course, when America also fell from grace.

There is young Alice, driving to meet Andrew, the first boy she's really loved. En route, she collides with his car and kills him.

Alice has never suffered fools, but from that point, she hardly suffers anyone, except for Andrew's low-life brother, Pete. She allows Pete to have sex with her (in all the most humiliating ways) as a kind of penance. She gets pregnant and, with the help of her liberal-minded grandmother, Emilie, has an abortion.

The guilt begins. And it never lets up, her whole life long.

In "American Wife," Sittenfeld hits all the hot spots: daughterhood, sex, money, career, marriage, motherhood.