Almost Perfect

Almost Perfect Alice Adams (Knopf, $23) This little melodrama takes us inside two people: a multifaceted, hypersexed genius of a lousy guy, designer Richard Fallon, and Stella Blake, a budding writer he ensnares. Their obsession careens in a drunken haze through 1980s San Francisco, from the highs of their sexy new love to lows that make you grind your teeth-such as when Richard, fooling around behind Stella's back, gives her a $300 cat named after his new German mistress. Richard's a womanizing rat and Stella barely survives him, so there's the promise here of a delicately brutal tale. But chatter and gossip without insight make only for a readable soap opera. B