SOURCE: "Growing up Assured," in The Sunday Herald Tribune Book Week, October 25, 1964, pp. 21, 23.

In the following review, Joseph comments on the plot, themes, and characters of With Shuddering Fall.

The enthusiasm that greeted Joyce Carol Oates last year upon the publication of her first volume, a collection of short stories called By the North Gate, clearly was not misplaced.

Her new book, a novel titled With Shuddering Fall, is set in the same world as the stories, a world of harsh weather, gratuitous destruction, inarticulate men without the veneer of culture facing the extreme experiences of life.

The central figures are Karen Herz, the beautiful 17-year-old daughter of a dominating but indulgent farmer, and the racing car driver Shar, who encounters Karen when he comes to attend the death of his demented father in a junk-filled cabin on the edge of the Herz property. From their meeting follow...