[Leonard Michaels] is a very funny man. Given a world where "no one feels anymore," where there is "no connection with elemental life," humor would appear out of place. On the contrary, [the stories in Going Places] remind us that humor is one of the few things that does have a place. Otherwise, as less resourceful fiction demonstrates, an overdose of anguish can become routine, even dull.

Mr. Michaels himself is never dull. His ability to set the commonplace alongside the unexpected and horrifying … demonstrates the maddening disorientation of modern man. Carefully controlled but always giving the impression of associative freedom, his prose drives from one fresh image to another. It tells us again and again that in spite of the odds against it, something is being said, not completely to be sure, nothing final, but something natural and necessary.

Comparisons with the free-flowing style of Donleavy, with...