ROUNDING THIRD AND HEADING HOME

It's hard to decide whether this patently autobiographical first novel is more offensive for its crassness or fatuity. Carter Phillips, a snide 17-year-old future Yalie from Baltimore, catalogues his wet dream fantasies about getting laid with all the rapt attention people paid to this subject in the '50's when there was nothing else to think about. Forget Vietnam, the peace movement, drugs, the Sexual Revolution and the various Liberations -- it's back to necking at drive-ins, vacations in Miami, prayers to the great god Zit, and a future in the Ivy League. Being the kind of fellow who gets upset if a girl unhooks her own bra, it's easy to see why no self-respecting lady would do more for him. Strictly a no-hitter.