Books: Odd Odyssey

CRESCENDO—BEING THE DARK ODYSSEY OF GILBERT STROED—Ethel Mannin—Doubleday, Doran ($2.50).

Once when Gilbert Stroud, aged 7, was fidgeting with a spoon and fork at table, his stepmother, nerve-wracked from maternity trouble, slapped him with the carving-knife. That, says Author Mannin, was the genesis of 1) a scar on his wrist, 2) his animosity towards women. Aged 10, when his friend's mother embraced him he wriggled out of it. Aged 20, off at the War, when the Stroud blood in him got hot for women, his mind remained cold as cash. Aged 25, he discovered that he wanted a fortune and a...