THE IVORY MISCHIEFArthur Meeker Jr.-Houghton, Mifflin ($2.75).
The Ivory Mischief* is not what it seems. It seems another of those long (840-page), thickly upholstered Jumbos of period fiction, with an advance printing (including Book-of-the-Month Club) of a quarter of a million copies. But unlike most books of the type, its re-creation is solid, convincing and intimate, its characterizations are shrewd, its style adult, and even the upholstery is interesting.
Author Meeker really knows and likes his subject, which is 17th-Century France. None of his major incidents, none of his characters, are invented; there is none of the usual effort to hand the reader...