THE RACK (414 pp.)A. E. EllisAtlantic-Little, Brown ($4.50).
On the face of it, this is a hospital novel that makes the most of medical melodrama. But it is as far removed from the usual scalpel-and-suture bestseller as a book on home remedies is from Gray's Anatomy, and it won the choicest collection of British reviews achieved by any book in 1958. Said the Times Literary Supplement: "The book exercises a complete fascination." Said the Irish Times: "Quite possibly a masterpiece." Despite the sometimes awesome gulf that separates British and U.S. tastes, U.S. readers are likely to find themselves agreeing with these judgments...