Surely Caroline and Ralph Carter, the vibrant, generous mid-sixties couple whose spirit keep the family in contact, are among the most successful middleage characters in literature. Adams's trademark use of the opening paragraph to create a model for her entire work is evident in the first image of the Carters: "impressive, even imposing . . . they are very large people, Caroline a tall fair woman, broad-faced, serene, with wideset green-blue eyes and heavy gray-blonde hair—and Ralph a towering, massive man." Their lives, however, have had ups and downs: "Ralph is Caroline's third husband, and she his fourth wife." Their warm, affirmative relationship, still very sexual, provides an anchor in the rather old-fashioned values they represent.

Ralph's death from stroke removes this connection with a more generous, open time in American life, leaving the moral universe open to the equivocal and selfserving values of those replacing him—the...