Home Depot heaven

Brooks' fans see him as wickedly irreverent. That image is based on his mastery of a single technique (and not a particularly original one, since it was first used by historian Paul Fussell in his 1983 book "Class: A Guide Through the American Status System"): He details, with the taxonomic precision of a zoologist, the habits and possessions of American social groups. "On Paradise Drive" takes a highly selective "tour" through a series of representative neighborhoods, starting from the city and heading out. Brooks describes the hipster enclave of "Bike-Messenger Land," where "You'll see transgendered tenants-rights activists with spiky Finnish hairstyles, heading from their Far Eastern aromatherapy sessions to loft-renovations seminars." Then come the "Crunchy Suburbs" where he observes "the sudden profusion of meat-free food co-ops, the boys with names like Mandela and Milo running around the all-wood playgrounds, the herbal soapmaking cooperatives," etc. Then there's the "Suburban Core," where "all those things that once seemed hopelessly outré -- cheerleaders, proms, country clubs, backyard barbecues and stay-at-home moms -- still thrive."

And onward, to a new phenomenon that Brooks considers highly significant, the exurbs. Here, where once was empty land for miles, subdivisions arise and are populated in a matter of months, and "you can cruise down flawless six-lane thoroughfares in trafficless nirvana." In these friction-free "Mayberries with Blackberries," the development trend called new urbanism has dictated the construction of artificial "town squares" lined with storefronts designed to look as if they weren't built all at once and rented out to chains like Restoration Hardware and Starbucks. Developers hire jugglers to simulate a "vibrant street life," and everyone wears khakis ordered from the Lands' End catalog and talks endlessly about their kids' sports teams.

This sort of thing feels vaguely insulting when Brooks is describing the subculture you belong to, but the payoff is that you get to smirk meanly when he's nailing, say, the $6 ice cream cone purchasers of the "Professional Zone," with their debates about "the merits and demerits of Corian countertops" and their streets where "there are so many blue New York Times delivery bags in the driveways ... they are visible from space." The meanness lies in knowing that every American wants to think that his or her lifestyle is a reflection of individual taste, and that the more affluent the person, the more dearly held is the delusion of originality. "You," says Woody Allen's Alvy Singer in "Annie Hall," to a character played by Carol Kane, "you're like New York, Jewish, left-wing, liberal, intellectual, Central Park West, Brandeis University, the socialist summer camps and the father with the Ben Shahn drawings, strike-oriented, red diaper ... " "I love being reduced to a cultural stereotype," she responds sarcastically.

This technique only works if it's deadly accurate, and recently Sasha Issenberg of Philadelphia Magazine caused a minor media furor when he was able to demonstrate that some of Brooks' claims about lower-middle-class neighborhoods in his area were wrong. He's not alone. I don't personally know much about Manhattan's ultrahip nightlife, but even I am aware that "rich and beautiful supermodels" don't "stand around in bars trying to look like Sylvia Plath and the Methadone Sisters." (Sylvia Plath may have been suicidal, but she always looked like the well-groomed, twin-set-clad Smith graduate she was, and supermodels haven't tried to resemble heroin addicts for years.) The kind of bohemians who talk "knowledgeably about Cuban film festivals" and "lament the spread of McDonald's and Disney and the threat of American cultural imperialism" do not frequent Ian Schrager hotels.

But this is mere pettifoggery. Brooks' cachet comes not from mocking metropolitan hipsters but from lecturing them on the fundamental goodness of the people of Exurbia, those Americans he christens, Adam-and-Eve style, as Patio Man and Realtor Mom. Granted, there's some gentle teasing about the monstrous size of their SUVs and their visits to megastore centers where "the parking lot is so big you could set off a nuclear device in the center and nobody would notice in the stores on either end." There's a line about how "in America it is acceptable to cut off any driver in a vehicle that costs a third more than yours. That's called democracy."

Next Page: In Brooks' universe, Patio Man and Realtor Mom express themselves entirely through what they buy

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