Wind Before Rain

HERE is a first novel of unusual power and promise. Tough-fibred and tightly written in a style which is concreteness and specificness made absolute, its plot is as tree from waste as its diction. As the author grows older he will learn to loosen up his style so that it will not so often suggest a tour de force; but here it is appropriate to his material, which is homely and stark and ultimately grim. The people are Virginians of the Blue Ridge hills of the Shenandoah, a community of revival meetings, hard farm work, hot passions, and intense friendliness. The story concerns the spell cast upon the younger folk by the sudden growth of a near-by town and the easy money it offers in mills and factories. The situation is symbolized in the separation of Hobe and Creed Kelvin because of Hobe’s love of his farm and Creed’s desire for adventure. As Jesse Stuart says on the jacket, ‘there is plot in the book — a wow of an ending.’ R. M. G.