[Insofar as "The Loved and Envied"] is about people and emotions, it is a very good book…. "Serena Blandish," [Miss Bagnold's second novel, was] an extraordinarily exact, lucid, and, in a wholly feminine way, strong account of the experiences that turn a girl into a woman. It was a brilliant start, which promised at least an English Colette. What followed, however, was a long silence, broken, finally, by ["National Velvet,"] an agreeable middle-brow comedy. (About her next novel, "The Door of Life," which was concerned largely with the glories of motherhood and the maternal instinct, the less said the better; it might have been written by a man.) But now, after more than twenty-five years, Miss Bagnold has abruptly turned back to the line of development she began with "Serena Blandish" and has to a considerable extent fulfilled its promise.

What "The Loved and Envied" does, and does...