1885 The Indifferent Children, by Louis Auchincloss (read 25 Nov 1984) This is the author's first novel, a 1947 effort he published under the name of Andrew Lee and which was republished, under his own name, in 1964. The protagonist, Beverly Stregelinus, is a New York socialite who goes into the Navy after Pearl Harbor and is sent to Panama. There he is attracted to Audrey Emerson, but gets engaged in Miami to Sylvia Tremaine. The book is readable, but it is surely not the work of a good writer--it has jumps and roughnesses, and really is gawkish. But it read all right, and one did not despise Stregelinus, even though he was an impossible character--in other words, in the court-martial examination proceeding he did not act in a way that the character he'd been drawn as could have acted. It is a creaky contrived novel. ( )

thoughtful, charming, harsh. ( )