MISS UNDINE’S LIVING ROOM

The third in Wilcox’s uproarious series of novels set in Tula Springs, Louisiana, this comedy of southern manners reminds us that Wilcox really gets his juices flowing when he’s back on his native soil, far from the Manhattan of his duller, more recent books. Though none of his narratives attains the unmitigated hilarity of Modern Baptists, this tale of religious fundamentalism, unemployment, and adultery comes close. In 1987, Kirkus noted that Wilcox drew a tighter knot around small-town life, and that his profiles “of casual corruption and amorality” were “all the more memorable for being so offhanded.” Wilcox, “one of the best plotters around,” sucks up his characters with “centrifugal motion.” Praising him over Updike as a chronicler of “American social reality and absurdity,” Kirkus was in awe of his ability to make “gags rise and then fade into something more melancholy.” In short, we were persuaded “he’s a master.” Too bad his later books haven’t sustained that rep.