OLIVE AND MARY ANNE
by James T. Farrell
Stonehill; 212 pages; $8.95
"Morris lit a cigarette. A woman in red walked by. She looked fresh; she seemed to be untouched by the sweltering heat. Morris stared after her. God, to have a woman like that!"
The cadence of the prose in Olive and Mary Anne is reminiscent of boots on pavement. The themes are not much subtler: an heiress slides into boozy decay; a proletarian poet recollects his childhood in an orphanage and his sexual initiation; a Communist seeks to tear down institutionsand dreams of dominating women. It scarcely matters what time is assigned...