Bottoms Up

Some novels are about what happens on a journey; this one is about what happens once you get to the destination--here, the state of total alcoholic indulgence enjoyed by narrator George Bancroft. After moving into the living room of his friend Hilliard's apartment, George almost immediately seduces Alice, the divorcee who lives upstairs, and starts hitting her up for drinks. Meanwhile, he sponges off an endless number of poorly individualized girlfriends and ex-girlfriends, sleeping with some and going on binges with others. It's disturbing that all these women seem to find Bancroft attractive, either despite or because of his drinking problem, while he looks upon each of them as simply another way to get laid or get drunk. The narrator's obvious intelligence is equally troubling: someone this smart ought to have no problem kicking a habit he knows is self-destructive, but one of the author's points is that, for alcoholics, recognizing the problem and acting to solve it are two different activities. Leavening his dark tale with black humor, Putnam writes with honest, unsparing self-awareness about an unstoppable addiction. This second in a projected series of four novels about George Bancroft ( By the Wayside appeared last year) demonstrates that, like strong liquor, a little degradation goes a long way. (Apr.)