First, suburban sex crime. Now, evil-nanny syndrome. Suzanne
Berne's first two novels are, as they say, straight out of today's
headlines. The books themselves, thankfully, are anything but
tabloid. In A CRIME IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD, her 1997 debut (and winner
of the UK's Orange Prize), a quiet suburb is shaken by the rape and
murder of a child, and an apparently normal family is rocked by
violence of a psychological kind. A PERFECT ARRANGEMENT, Berne's
latest, also takes place in the ordinary and terrifying sphere of
domestic life --- in this case, what happens when a brilliant
nanny, Mary Poppins style, enters (or is invades a better word?)
the highly imperfect Cook-Goldman family.

A PERFECT ARRANGEMENT begins right smack in the middle of Mirella
and Howard's morning mess (literal and figurative) as they struggle
to get their daughter Pearl ready for school and their possibly
learning-disabled son Jacob fed and settled, let out the dog,
launch themselves to work --- and all the other innumerable things
that seem to need fixing whenever you have ten minutes to get out
of the house. The first chapter is from Mirella's point of view;
subsequent chapters alternate between her, Howard, and the new
nanny Randi.

Immediately we know that All Is Not Well with Randi. But we don't
know, exactly, what the problem is or how it will play out, which
sets up a terrific page-turning tension from the start. Without
divulging too much, I can safely say that Randi herself exemplifies
the chasm between the image of the perfect suburban/small-town
family and the considerably more painful and disordered reality.
For Randi is every homemaking stereotype come to life: nutritious
meals, elaborate birthday parties, Christmas cookies, and creative
games issue from her as if she were a walking, talking issue of
Good Housekeeping.

So what's wrong with that? After all, Mirella too has bought into
the idea that she must be the Perfect Mother, even though she is a
full-time lawyer as well. She is torn by the warring demands of
momhood and her profession (of course), just as Howard is washed by
doubts about his career and guilt about a fleeting affair --- and
if both Cook-Goldmans feel a bit like people we have met before,
the honesty and intelligence of Berne's writing largely avoids
cliche. It helps that the minor characters are particularly well
drawn: Howard's brother and sister-in-law; the Indian family across
the street; and Martha, the family's endearingly named golden
retriever. Aging and essentially passive, the dog is a presence
that seems to represent the assumption that life will unroll
peacefully and inevitably, with only minor crises, day after day
--- an assumption that is rudely shattered.

The dramas of the plot do heat up rather violently toward the end
of A PERFECT ARRANGEMENT. There are confrontations galore --- very
Hollywood, very cinematic --- that sit oddly with the low-key irony
and realism that inform most of the book. And, in fact, this novel
is not as subtle and bitter, as finely and economically crafted as
A CRIME IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD. The older book has the clarity and
lack of extraneous detail that comes with perspective --- indeed,
it is remote from us in two respects: The point of view is that of
a woman looking back on her 10-year-old self, and the action is set
in the '70s. In the new novel, there is no escaping into the
distance; the effect is more of being jammed up against all the
untidy details of right now. Berne is brave to attempt this, and if
A PERFECT ARRANGEMENT is not quite perfect, she has nonetheless
written a smart, moving and highly readable book.