Combining glittering wit, an atmosphere dense in social paranoia, and a breathtaking elegance and precision of language, Whites first novel suggests a hilarious apotheosis of the comedy of manners For, on the privileged island community where Forgetting Elena takes place, manners are everything Or so it seems to Whites excruciatingly selfconscious young narrator who desperately wants to be accepted in this world where everything from ones bathroom habits to the composition of spontaneous poetry is subject to rigid conventions