TURPIN by Stephen Jones. 307 pages. Macmillan. $5.95.
"I wanted to leave, but felt like a man on a crowded escalator waiting for the right step to get off, afraid to reveal his panic to the other shoppers by bolting too soon and the whole time crushed by visions of what would happen when he shreds under, riser and tread, all his ribbon and wrapping adangle down the dark side of the moon." This is Turpin—college graduate, widower, veterinarian, and part-time lobster fisherman—forging flinchingly ahead in three days of misadventure that resembles a manic...