内容摘要：Bauer reported from Madison, Wisconsin and Bellisle from Seattle. Associated Press writers Jack Dura in Bismarck, North Dakota, David Collins in Hartford, Connecticut, Gisela Salomon in Miami, John O’Connor in Springfield, Illinois, Valerie Gonzalez in McAllen, Texas and Hannah Fingerhut in Des Moines, Iowa, contributed.

Bauer reported from Madison, Wisconsin and Bellisle from Seattle. Associated Press writers Jack Dura in Bismarck, North Dakota, David Collins in Hartford, Connecticut, Gisela Salomon in Miami, John O’Connor in Springfield, Illinois, Valerie Gonzalez in McAllen, Texas and Hannah Fingerhut in Des Moines, Iowa, contributed.

Edward Jonathan Caiga, 42, left, and his partner Kunchanok Khantiphong, 27, watch television at home in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, July 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)Kunchanok said the law was a milestone in a country where it used to be very hard to love someone from the same gender.

“After this law, we can be a whole package with each other. A real couple. A legal couple. I’ll be able to take care of him because he’s alone here,” he said.On a clear Saturday morning, the couple rode their bikes to a nearby park to feed the birds and fish. Later, they had a video call with Edward’s family in the Philippines.“Thailand is now what I call home,” Edward said.

Kunchanok khantiphong, 27, speaks with a family member of his Filipino partner Edward Jonathan Caiga, 42, in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, July 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)Kunchanok khantiphong, 27, speaks with a family member of his Filipino partner Edward Jonathan Caiga, 42, in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, July 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)

Kunchanok Khantiphong, 27, and his Filipino partner Edward Jonathan Caiga, 42, left, feed bread to fish at Nong Bon Lake park in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, July 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)

Kunchanok Khantiphong, 27, and his Filipino partner Edward Jonathan Caiga, 42, left, feed bread to fish at Nong Bon Lake park in Bangkok, Thailand, Saturday, July 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)Though his overall tone is triumphal, Denby does not shy away from portraying their dark sides: Brooks’ need to dominate any room of writers; Bernstein’s sexual dalliances and later in life, his crude public behavior; Mailer’s promiscuity and the stabbing of his second wife; and Frieden’s mutually abusive marriage and difficulty sharing the spotlight with other feminist leaders.

At times, though, the book drags. Denby has clearly done so much research and is so besotted with his subjects that he is loath to leave anything out — though it is not hard to see why. One anecdote is juicier than the next, the literary equivalent of those lavish spreads at the Jewish resorts in the Catskills of yore where Brooks got his start and whose menus Denby lovingly recalls: chilled schav (sorrel soup) with sliced egg, boiled yearling fowl in a pot, and Vienna almond crescent.A woman meets a man half her age at a sleek Manhattan restaurant for lunch. Is he her lover or her son? If the former, then you might expect her to wield the power, like the character of Mrs. Robinson in “The Graduate,” Mike Nichols’ 1967 film about a young man who has an affair with one of his parents’ friends. If the latter, then you might expect the young man, Xavier, to wield the power because youth outshines age and parents, for the most part, are willing to go to almost any length to make their kids happy.

In her latest novel, “Audition,”exploits all the tension and ambiguity inherent in that opening scene to craft a short, propulsive novel that suggests that at work and in life, we are constantly trying out roles and making it up as we go along. Or, to quote