7½ CENTS (245 pp.} Richard BissellAtlantic-Little, Brown ($3.50).
One of the best-tested axioms of the writing business is: "Stick to what you know." By sticking close to what he knows, and by being casual about it, Author Richard Pike Bissell, 39, has won a reputation as a highly readable fellow.
A Stretch on the River (TIME, July 24, 1950) was a ribald first novel about the life Bissell had known as a Mississippi River pilot. In The Monongahela, he used more personal experience to pump some fresh water into the brackish Rivers of America series. More recently, Bissell has been working in his...