QUINCIE BOLLIVER

A long, solid and graphic story localized in a Texas oil town, a novel with a certain blunt strength derived from its obvious authenticity -- but with no cumulative action, and therefore holding power. It is a loosely woven story, a series of episodes over a period of years in the life of Quincie, who comes to the oil field with her father, a mule skinner. Of his second marriage, to Judith Paradise, a hard, masculine woman -- living in the hopes of sudden wealth through oil; of Elly, her daughter, who matures more quickly and more gracefully than Quincie and steals her first love; of Elly's death (after pregnancy and abortion), and Quincie's final recognition of her love for a sturdy, faithful oil man. Oppressive heat, squalor, and dust shrouding the danger -- and glamor -- of the oil field, and the lives spent under its promise, all portrayed with great realism.