FRACTIONS

Fractions = 1/3 talent, 1/8 gall, 2/5 candid concupiscence, 1/4 shock of recognition, 1/9 wordplay along with recondite referrals, and 1/7 playful permutations. Some of this is inherited from the Maestro since Andrew Field, you may remember, did the serious study of Nabokov two years ago. Here Field is reintroduced in a querulous foreword by Forward, a former friend and editor whose wife he later claims to have shared. But for the purposes of Fractions he appears as Dirk Yarborough, married to said wife Victoria although the union becomes more and more lackluster. During this time Yarborough is annexed by Jenny Lincoln (whose other name is Mary FitzWilson and you'll get no help on that one) to do reviews for her little ""serious"" magazine Atheneum. And also drifting in and out of Atheneum and the subject of much literary discussion is one Dick Upjohn who will certainly need no further identification. If none of the above fractions quite prove out, neither does this as a novel although there are enough brighter moments to assure Mr. Field some of the attention he is trying to get. . . . Snacks--caviar and chutzpah.