Volume 25, Number 10 · June 15, 1978
Forced Marches
By Robert Towers
Airships
by Barry Hannah
Knopf, 209 pp., $8.95
Detour
by Michael Brodsky
Urizen Books, 359 pp., $8.95
The two books under review could have been chosen (as they were not) to illustrate fundamentally divergent approaches to the use of narrative action or event in contemporary fiction. Plot—in the sense of a shaped series of events leading through complication to some kind of resolution or conclusion—is still a scarce commodity in serious literature, though there has recently been some reaction in its favor. The craving for story is probably as intense as ever, but to gratify it one must turn to the writers of 'adult' children's books (Tolkien) or to the purveyors of crime and suspense (a number of whom happen to be good writers). Or else be prepared to abandon seriousness altogether and grab some lively trash from the nearest paperback stand.
Review, 2054 words
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