In the Beauty of the Lilies can best be classified as a chronicle novel, a popular genre in twentieth-century American fiction. Linked to historical events, it depicts the lives of a single family over a number of generations. Like the novels of Kenneth Roberts, John Jakes, and Howard Fast (to name but a few), it relies on real chronology to establish background and setting for the fictionalized accounts of the family whom Updike chooses as his representatives of Americans affected by the changes in technology, politics, culture, and religion over the course of the century. Among the more noted literary figures who have also written works of importance in this genre is John Steinbeck, whose East of Eden (1952) tells the story of three generations of an American family. Like Updike, Steinbeck uses the chronicle novel to explore not only the development of the American character, but...