Change of Partners

A West Coast hippie commune is the setting for Margolis's (The Stepman) second novel, a sweet-spirited tale about a group of young people trying to create a laid-back Eden. In June 1970, Sam Shames, a 24-year-old Brooklyn-born grocer's son and college drop-out, hitchhikes his way out of his claustrophobic life in Manhattan. Abandoning San Francisco when his job is terminated and hitching toward Oregon, Sam is picked up and taken home by Jack and Joan, a young married couple who have made their sex lives a group affair. He soon finds a warm welcome among a group of like-minded searchers who have ""no rules, except to be mellow."" Among them are pregnant Claudia; flute-playing Will; and Helene, the group's high-strung scribe. Led by Jack, the commune, which has barely scratched out a subsistence living, begins to follow a kind of work ethic. In two years, they redesign the goats' paddock and build a couple of cabins. Although the dance of sexual pairings exacerbates the group's internecine power struggles, the worst one commune member can say about another is that ""he isn't communal."" Former commune member Margolis's writing shades into tie-dyed purple at times. Overall, however, he demonstrates a natural storyteller's ability to inhabit each of his principal characters, capturing the blend of innocence and self-indulgence that makes the counterculture seem like such a fanciful, faraway time. (Aug.)