By any standard—and surely these days books for the 14-year-old upwards ought to stand up as adult fare—[Jazz Country] is an excellent novel. Not only does Nat Hentoff show with great perception the development of one boy's understanding of other people, but without any strain, without recourse to either hip jargon or learned explanations, he opens for the uninitiated the significance of the world of jazz….

Tom is a nice guy, making good grades at school and with the kind of calm, sympathetic parents every teenager must long to have. The narrative comes clearly and straightforwardly from his lips. "Your life has been too easy for you to be making it as a jazz musician", the Negro bass player in the great Moses Godfrey's band tells him after hearing his talented but heartless trumpet playing. "And too white", adds his militant wife, Mary. By the end...