what we would today call the "preppie class." Cheever views his subjects with sympathy but detachment, engendered his per- sonal demons-a stormy marriage, alcoholism, and, later in life, grow- ing homosexual proclivities.
With the exception of his first two (and best) novels, The Wapshot Chronicle (1957) and The Wapshot Scandal (1964), Cheever's books were attempts to exorcize those troubles and find redemption, argues Gus- sow. Both Bullet Park (1 969) and Falconer (1977) worked poorly...