Stone--Overboard?

[Steelhead]

Mike, expostulates:

>Holy cow;

<major snippage>

>>I hope DeLillo relocates his roots and produces more good, but small works.
But fear he has gone over the edge with Robert Stone.

>Is this the Robert Stone of Hall of Mirrors, Dog Soldiers, Children of
>Light, Flag for Sunrise and Outerbridge Reach? When did he go over the edge?

I like Stone. But Hall of Mirrors was a mess, wasn't? I mean that book
could have used a harsh editor. Dog Soldiers and Flag for Sunrise were
perfect. Flag was one of the best books of the 1980s. Children of Light, by
comparison, seemed like a bad imitation of Mailer's The Deer Park, while
Outerbridge Reach was a finely-tuned imitation of, well, Cheever--of all
people. Now--instead of the long-promised re-write of Stendhal's
*Love*--he's working on another book about sailing. What's that all about?
Well, Stone is developing the paunch of Dennis Connor.

Steely