<DIV><DIV>A <I>New York Times</I> Notable Book of the Year<DIV><DIV>&nbsp;</DIV><DIV><I>The Discomfort Zone</I> is Jonathan Franzen&#8217;s &nbsp;tale of growing up, squirming in his own &#252;ber-sensitive skin, from a &#8220;small and fundamentally ridiculous person,&#8221; into an adult with strong inconvenient passions.&nbsp;Whether he&#8217;s writing about the explosive dynamics of a Christian youth fellowship in the 1970s, the effects of Kafka&#8217;s fiction on his protracted quest to lose his virginity, or the web of connections between bird watching, his all-consuming marriage, and the problem of global warming, Franzen is always feelingly engaged with the world we live in now.&nbsp;<I>The Discomfort Zone</I> is a wise, funny, and gorgeously written self-portrait by one of America&#8217;s finest writers.<B></B></DIV></DIV></DIV></DIV>