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the deUghtful accounts of the day-today particulars of dictionary making almost overshadow the gory descriptions of Minor's murderous insanity and his QvU War traumas. Winchester's tone is playful and seU-consdously 'Victorian, as in his coyly euphemistic reference to the act of sexual intercourse as "the ultimate ." More disturbing is his tendency to speculate, sometimes wUdly. When relating Minor's arrival at the asylum, he writes, "He heard the outer gates open to let the carriage out, then close again. There was a resounding crash as the inner metal gates shut and were bolted and chained." Winchester's bent toward melodrama peaks in one of the last chapters of the book, where he proposes a lurid scenario in Minor's Ufe, the unlikelihood of which even he seems ashamed by, since he brackets the scene with disclaimers describing it as "a reason that some might think rather stretches creduUty" and "a possibiUty —not a probabUity to be sure." These forays into sensationalist fantasy detract from a story that is otherwise memorable for its wealth of detaU. (TH) Tomato Red by Daniel Woodrell Henry Holt & Company, 1998, 225 pp., $20 The unforgettable narrator of Daniel WoodreU's sixth novel is Sammy Barlach, a crank addict and surprisingly good natured loser in search of friendship. After a night in a drug-induced haze, Sammy breaks into a mansion in the Uttle Ozark town of West Table, Missouri, intending to burglarize it. Instead, he falls asleep in a chair. He is awakened by Jamalee Merridew, a fiery redhead with delusions of grandeur, and her gorgeous brother, Jason. To satisfy Jamalee 's yearning for the good life, the two routinely break into wealthy homes when the owners are away, dress in their clothes, eat their food and pretend to be rich people. Out of loneliness, and the need to be someone's hero, Sammy soon becomes involved with Jamalee and her family, who live in Venus HoUer, the poorest section of West Table. Bev, their mother, the town prostitute, has learned to endure, and even to enjoy, her miserable life, but Jamalee and Jason dream only of escape. Jamalee plans on using her "country queer" brother's extraordinary good looks to prostitute him to the wealthy female population of the town, then blackmail them to fund her extravagant dreams. The one thing that enables her to get through her miserable dayto -day existence is a vision of a better world in Beverly Hüls. Any of the vividly drawn main characters could lay claim to being the antihero of this book, but the novel really belongs to Sammy. WoodreU takes him on a journey through poverty, unexpected friendships —and even murder. With an ear for dialect and an eye for the details of "white trash" existence, the author creates memorable characters who, through their horrible naïveté, perform unbeUevably stupid acts. Sometimes it is hard to know whether to root for them or slap them in the face. In this fast-paced read there are so many plot twists that we never reaUy know what is around the next corner (the last fifty pages alone 176 · The Missouri Review could sell the book). But WoodreU's abUity to turn a phrase is enthralling, and the roller coaster ride is so enjoyable that it finally doesn't matter where we end up. (JB) Reviews by: Marta Boswell, Kris Somerville, Elizabeth Knies, Brett Rogers, Preston Merchant, Speer Morgan, Joy Luz, Evelyn Somers, Tina Hall, Jackie Bledsoe American First Novels, 1998 by Bruce Allen Nineteen ninety-seven was pretty much dominated by eagerly awaited and loudly trumpeted new works from many of America's most highly regarded novelists. Thomas Pynchon's imposing Mason & Dixon and Don De LUlo's encyclopedic Underworld topped most critics' polls, with works by such sirrdlarly grave and revered figures as Saul BeUow, Norman MaUer, PhUip Roth and Louis Auchincloss lurking dose behind them. Nevertheless, that year's most honored fiction was Charles Frazier's richly detaUed and deeply moving first novel, Cold Mountain, perhaps the finest portrayal to date in our Uterature of the QvU War and its effect on ordinary people. If nothing of quite that stature has emerged...

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