Books
Short Reviews
by Phoebe Adams
by Vassilis Vassilikos. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $6.95. When a liberal politician was murdered in Salonika a few years ago, the affair was followed by a discreditable amount of official shuffling and cover-up. Mr. Vassilikos, a Greek author who has lived abroad since the take-over of his country by drill sergeants, has written a novel based on this murder, a quietly furious book which alternates blunt factual narrative with metaphorical reflections on death, love, and immortality. The unexpected mixture works well and produces a fascinating novel, promptly banned in Greece. Anyone who chooses to see in the book either a portrait of the Greek military dictatorship or a warning against police states in general will be quite justified.