A modern retelling of Balzac's classic "Cousin Bette "by one of America's most prolific and significant writers. Earl, a black, gay actor working in a meatpacking plant, and Bette, a white secretary, have lived next door to each other in the same Greenwich Village apartment building for thirty years. Shamed and disowned by their families, both found refuge in New York and in their domestic routine. Everything changes when Hortense, a wealthy young actress from Ohio, comes to the city to "make it." Textured with the grit and gloss of midcentury Manhattan, "The Cosmopolitans "is a lush, inviting read.The truths it frames about the human need for love and recognition remain long after the book is closed.