David Brooks' latest installment of a genre he calls "comic sociology" is both a parody of and paean to America's "middle to upper middle class strivers."

On Paradise Drive continues in the vein the author, now an op-ed columnist at The New York Times, established in his best-selling Bobos in Paradise. This time, however, the focus is not on the idiosyncracies of "bourgeois bohemians," but the mystery of American motivation as illustrated through the exodus into its final frontier: suburbia.

"We are living in the age of the American Empire," Brooks writes. "And America is a suburban nation, so we are living in the age of the First Suburban Empire. And what the heck is that?"

To find out, we're guided on a discursive suburban safari that starts in downtown urbania (where the chief export is "cool") and heads out to the sprawling abyss of the new exurbs (think Highlands Ranch). On Paradise Drive is partly a binge on curious demographics, another part celebration of America's religion of success, and a happy-go-lucky skewering of suburban types.

Like a Borscht Belt comic transported to the Blackberry era, Brooks deploys a unique phraseology to describe stock suburban characters and the ideologies that inform their parenting, education and spirituality.

Take the "uber mom," a classic product of the affluent inner suburbs. A former corporate strategist, the uber mom deploys her energy and $950,000 education to rearing young achievers. "Uber moms are easily recognizable," Brooks notes, "because they generally weigh less than their children."

But the uber mom is merely a byproduct of "the Achievatron," that is, a "cross generational conspiracy to produce success." In the Achievatron, American children are more supervised than any generation in history.

They study harder, require PDAs to negotiate their activity schedules and often own three separate helmets for sports. In such a context, Brooks' advice that his own children pursue careers in "play date law" seems less fatuous than frighteningly plausible.

Of course, Brooks' suburbia is ripe with subsets. The "crunchy suburbs," for instance, are the domain of NPR liberals. These bulwarks against consumerism are an accepting place where "the energy that once went into sex and raving now goes into salads."

By contrast, the sprawling exurbs are a culture in which golf is less a sport than a pastoral ideal. In these conservative strongholds (according to Brooks the exurbs are overwhelmingly Republican, while many of the inner ring burbs have transitioned to Democratic turf), "bitter sarcasm is frowned upon, for it represents a crease in the emotional surface of the neighborhood."

All skewering aside, On Paradise Drive has a serious point, which is that America has changed radically in the last 50 years. Not to the left or right, but to the patio, to the allure of "golf communities" in places like Mesa, Ariz., Loudoun County, Va., and our own Douglas County. Places that are marked, or marred, with cul de sac developments, bequeathed with names like "Bella Vista at Renaissance Premier." (I'm not making that up; it's in Longmont.)

The way a gossip columnist drops names, Brooks drops demographic factoids to illustrate what he calls "the great dispersal." For instance, in 1950 only 23 percent of Americans lived in suburbs; now the majority does. And the exodus is not limited to homes, but businesses as well. According to Brooks, there's now more office space in the suburbs of major cities than in the city proper, with New York and Chicago providing the only exception.

Brooks extends these shifts to paint a sketch of the American character, one he sees as possessing an insatiable hunger for the frontiers of the future, for monomaniacal pursuits of success that often wind up prohibiting the enjoyment of that success. This, however, is where On Paradise Drive loses focus. An internal migration isn't necessarily indicative of a national character, if such a thing even exists.

Brooks is an idea guy who peddles generalities, thus the force of his arguments often teeter for lack of evidence beyond the anecdotal. While his satire is original and funny, it doesn't push the arguments forward. Rather, after prolonged exposure, these comic riffs often seem better suited for the "Shouts and Murmurs" section of The New Yorker.

Despite its many potshots, On Paradise Drive suggests that the new growth of American suburbs is nothing more than a benign byproduct of a collective will to achieve. However, this raises an implicit question: What about Americans suffering from ambition deficiency - folks who don't strive, but merely coast into any number of life's stations, be it a crop field, factory or the White House?

The suburban empire of Brooks' imagination appears to be stocked exclusively with products of the Achievatron. One wonders if the man has ever met an actual American loser?

Surely in the expanses of parking lot tundra he's so familiar with, there's someone without Blackberries - or grand plans. Perhaps Brooks might turn his eyes on them; who knows what we might learn?

John Dicker is a writer based in Colorado Springs. His book, "The United States of Wal-Mart," is due out next year from Tarcher.