Books: No Myth

THE IRON HOOP (268 pp.)—Cons/crn-tine FitzGibbon—Knopf ($3).

Last year, with The Arabian Bird, Author FitzGibbon showed the critics that he could write a pretty good first novel. This time he has attempted the poet's task of turning history into myth, without the poet's vision. Though the result is bad myth, it is not a complete failure as a novel.

The Iron Hoop presents itself as the story of any occupation after any war. The conquered are represented by "The Hero," an aging visionary; Bud, a sex-happy racketeer; Paul, a boy trying to do the man's work of revolution, and his sister Anna, the...