BUT A LITTLE MOMENT

A long, tentative, and sometimes speculative first novel which is not too sharp in its direction and which follows first the itinerant career of Adam Allen, a construction man, later that of his son, Jason. Born and bred in the Kentucky mountains, Adam's work leads him from place to place, proves a dsive element in his marriage to Jane who finds some compensation in the five children she bears. With the marriage of the older girls, Jason outs himself off from his family, is footloose for a time, then joins the CCC. There in the first months follows the coy chase by an older woman, the friendship with Duquesne, a confused intellectual, and finally the meeting with Geneva, daughter of Sertus, a corrupt, powerful politician. With Jason's failure to fall into line with Sertus' plans, the romance is broken up for a time, but Geneva calls him back and they have a few weeks of marriage before Jason ships out for the war overseas... The disorientation here is communicative, and this is hard to place for a general market.