THE LIGHT OUTSIDE
By
Marc Savage's first novel is an adventure comic book about the generation which came to manhood at the height of the Vietnam War. His collegiate-style humor and ingenuous bonhomie mark each of the Sixties set pieces which comprise his hero's rites of passage--communicating with lovable Mom and Dad, thumbing on the road, boozing, bailing and drug-taking in the East Village, protest marches, community meetings, police harassment. Caleb Yarrow is just 22 when he finishes his prison term for draft-dodging and arrives on East Sixth Street in New York to find his favorite cousin Jesse vanished, perhaps involved with the bomb which will later blow up the bank where Cal's new black girlfriend works. As a mythical superhero, Cousin Jesse from Michigan rivals the Lone Ranger, and Cal Yarrow hasn't many more human weaknesses--his moral earnestness is so heavy it swamps the novel entirely.