While still in his 40's, Gold had published perhaps a hundred short stories and as many articles, most of them knowledgeable, polished and promising. He was considered by many "a writer to watch," one of the possible heirs apparent of the Bellow-Malamud generation….

By the time "The Great American Jackpot" and "Swifty the Magician" appeared, the pendulum had swung and reviewers were ready to pan books that were not so very different from those that had been praised.

It is easier to point out what is wrong with Gold's novels than to discover why critics and the public were so slow to react to these flaws—or why they reacted to them at all. Though Gold often substitutes shtik for character development in his novels, so do quite a few other authors … without suffering any loss of popularity….

Perhaps Mr. Gold's trouble is not that his books are...