[This "fabrication," "The Short Reign of Pippin IV,"] is a froth of a book which must have been great fun to write. In addition, it is one of the purest expressions of true, simple, American affection for the French that has ever been written—compounded with our equally simple conviction that they are also, after all, a funny race.

Mr. Steinbeck's hero is Pippin Arnulf Héristal, a middle-aged amateur astronomer….

The unfolding of M. Héristal's story is directed not by anything he has done, but by something that he is: in his veins flows the blood of Charlemagne…. Thus, when sometime in the near future a French government expires into slightly more than normal anarchy, and every other party has talked itself hoarse, the patient monarchists are able to make themselves heard…. [An] ancient descendant of the Merovingian nobility is able to propose that the line...