Books: Crack in the Picture Window

THE HOUSEBREAKER OF SHADY HILL (185 pp.)—John Cheever—Harper ($3).

The people of John Cheever's stories dwell among the shifting symbols of success, where the status is very seldom quo. Most of them live in Manhattan or commute to its skyscraper hives, for that is where the honey is. But somehow their lives, loves and labors leave the cuprous taste of pennies in their mouths; the middle-income bracket is their social vise. Few writers have probed the masked anxieties of the "have-not-enoughs" with the skill and authority of John (The Wapshot Chronicle) Cheever, 46. After Marquand, he is the ablest chronicler of the...

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