Do the Windows Open?

In nine overlapping tales, Hecht paints a portrait of a high-strung photographer as a married but childless macrobiotic baby boomer whose most significant relationship is with her reproductive surgeon. She’s a misanthrope (her fellow New Yorkers go about ”their daily rounds of wrong choices and futile pursuits”) who’s prone to recreational character assassination, but she gives special immunity to balding men honest enough to brush their hair straight back, in lieu of a comb-over. Hecht’s stories in Do the Windows Open? are driven by blistering cynicism, but her tiresome preoccupation with organic vegetables and home renovation sometimes drags them down.