Original Sins is a big, fat novel that looks as though it should be sold by weight - 'a couple of pounds of fiction, today, please.' It has the air of the novel as commodity, of an item designed to be sold, a programmed bestseller. Amateur Passions is a slender, almost anorexic collection of short stories, each one pared down to the glittering bone, fiction produced by authentic internal compulsion. Although carving on ivory is not the easiest thing in the world, it is possible to maintain a very high degree of quality control over short runs, and Lorna Tracy's quality control is so stringent that there is not one flabby sentence or second-hand image in the whole book. The same cannot be said for Alther, who is often reduced to stylistic tics such as '"I don't hate men," said Emily with hatred,' and, like many American writers, believes it is possible to summon up an entire social ambience by the judicious use of brand names, such as Bass Wejuns and I.L. Bean down vests.

LRB 2 July 1981 | PDF Download