THE GLITTERING SHORES

In her second novel the author of (1950) follows the life of Philip lilies- and the women whose impact conditioned it. First there is his Mother whose geniality and invisible obsessiveness set his pattern of appeal to all women; later Helen, direct and almost insensitive, who becomes his wife and who is losing her fight against her mother-in-law's perfections and Philip's growing dislike of his marriage; and third there is Leonie, who was gawky and rebellious when he first knew her and whose slumberous ease now wins him away from his accepted treadmill. The unaccented proddings of his mother, the cumulative effect of the little irritations Helen produces, together with his business dissatisfactions and unhappy, inner reflections of the world today- all combine to make him easy prey for Leonie. The announcement of his partnership in the architectural firm precipitates both personal and business problems, and with Leonie's and his mother's hold broken, he wakes to the safety and durability of his marriage. Not the intense quality of Frances but the same careful charting of period ('30's and '40's), its pressures and their results, and a thoughtful tracing of the conflicts involved when personality and emotions and circumstances deeply interact. Though the story is Philip's, the interest is in the women.