Hunters and Gatherers

The New York Times-bestselling author takes on New Agers as one woman searches for meaning in this "e;brilliantly satiric but . . . sweet-natured"e; novel (Publishers Weekly). Thirty-year-old Martha is stagnating in a demeaning, woefully underpaid job as a fact-checker at frothy fashion magazine Mode and an unhappy relationship with an unrepentant jerk. But she stumbles upon an unlikely new circle of friends when she interrupts a goddess-worshipping ceremony on Fire Island and ends up rescuing its accident-prone leader, Isis Moonwagon, from the waves. From the steel skyscrapers of Manhattan to a sweat lodge in the Arizona desert, Martha chases fulfillment and self-actualization in the company of this group of opinionated, bumbling women, but the revelations she receives are not necessarily what she expected. "e;Prose's satiric vision could not be more sharply focused here, and her powers of observation and deadpan humor never falter"e; as she sends up the New Age movement and its over-earnest adherents (The Miami Herald).