Up in the Air - Walter Kirn

From Walter Kirn comes a brilliantly diverting novel that peers deeply into the world of modern business and its debilitating effects on the human soul. Meet Ryan Bingham, a contemporary Willy Loman--he just travels faster and carries more advanced gadgets in his briefcase. Ryan Bingham's job as a Career Transition Counselor-he fires people-has kept him airborne for years. Although he has come to despise his line of work, he has come to love the culture of what he calls Airworld, finding contentment within pressurized cabins, anonymous hotel rooms, and a wardrobe of wrinkle-free slacks. With a letter of resignation sitting on his boss's desk, and the hope of a job with a mysterious consulting firm, Ryan Bingham is agonizingly close to his ultimate goal, his Holy Grail: one million frequent flier miles. But before he achieves this long-desired freedom, conditions begin to deteriorate. With perception, wit, and wisdom, Up in the Air combines brilliant social observation with an acute sense of the psychic costs of our rootless existence, and confirms Walter Kirn as one of the most savvy chroniclers of American life.