BOOKS

BEHIND THESE WALLS, An Unusual Story of Prison Life by Christopher Teale, Frederick Fell, New York, 1957, $3.

A plain unvarnished tale, pleasantly heartwarming, and essentially true, according to the introduction, about an older prisoner's concern for a soft young boy, who after a sudden and irrational crime of passion, is faced with a life sentence. Red, the youngster, is appealingly naive. Tex is described as almost completely amoral until his concern for the boy begins to ripen into a self-sacrificing love.

The story is told, sincerely and unpretentiously against a stark background composed in equal portions of the usual violent prison-revelations of knifings, escapes and all manner of larcenies, and an astonishingly frank catalogue of most aspects of homosexual life in a large prison. The big mystery that sustains the whole engrossing but sometimes crude account is the question: will Red ever get out -and without losing his virginity?

I frankly liked this, though there were spots where the plain tale could have been made more dramatic-and I must admit I added considerably to my gay vocabulary. . . .

Lyn Pedersen

THE DANGEROUS GAMES by Tereska Torres, Dial Press, $2.75, 119 pp.

There are whores and there are whores. They are all thought of as bad, but there are some who are interesting and some who are low. The latter de-

scription fits Juliette, the so-called heroine of the book. Supposedly happily married with two charming children, she crawls out of one bed and into another. Upon discovery of her husband Frederick having an affair with a blond chanteuse called Francoise, one gets the idea of Juliette telling him. "That's all right, honey, I'll have an affair with her, too.' She kisses Francoise on her cheek and thinks of going to bed with her. Poor Francoise tries to have an affair with Alain, whom Juliette thinks of as a homosexual. If he's a homosexual, well really, my dear, they just don't carry on like that. So Juliette, the minute. her 'dear friend' Francoise's back is turned. leaves her happy home and. goes to bed with Alain several times. Juliette calls this playing a 'dangerous game,' but she doesn't seem to want to stop. She has to jump out of bed in plenty of time to hurry home and kiss her children goodnight, and if she weren't on time, why it would just be unbearable. Alain goes away and she rejoins her happy home.

And they call the homosexual queer? And his so-called 'marriage' with another of his kind sinful?

Tereska Torres wrote the highly successful Woman's Barracks. She should have stuck to writing similar books on that theme. Save your money and buy your boy friend a bouquet of roses or your girl friend a box of cigars. The games you play afterwards won't seem so dangerous.

THE CONFESSION,

Arnell Larsen

by Mario Soldati, Knopf $3.00, 180 pp.

The orthodox thinker will nothing but the bold work of the Devil in Mario Soldati's most recent novel, The Confession. On the other hand, the creative thinker will discover in this scenario-like, almost

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