Rafferty Bloom, Irish and Jewish, Abbott (Abby) Austin, proper and inhibited Bostonian, and Vincent Cole, a local New Haven product and not above advancing himself by any means, meet at Yale, go their individual ways after ... Vairāk graduation, and, with the death of Abby's architect uncle, form a partnership in Taunton, Conn. Vince has married Troy, Abby's improper Bostonian sister whose insistence on integrity causes the breakup of the firm -- and her marriage; Abby's marriage to Nina, who had carefully planned on it, ends in divorce with her crack-up over men and sex; Raff, on his own in a more isolated town in Connecticut, has the young minister, Stringer, champion his unorthodox design for a new church, against vicious opposition, physical tests and community upheaval. Vindication comes when the New England Arts Festival awards is given to the church -- and when Troy and Raff are able to face their love squarely. A meticulous blueprint reveals the many aspects of architecture: -- the training; the practical experience in big and small firms and towns; as a business and as a social adjunct. It contrasts architectural precision against personal muddling; and dots the i's and crosses the t's explicitly. The information here perhaps outweighs the characterization and emotionalization.

    Though they thought alike on almost all matters, they agreed on none; least of all did they see eye to eye on the subject of men. Jessica, pretty and popular, invited them to come and stay; Mr. de Vrais, irritable and suspicious, invited them to go away and stay away. Fortune-hunters all, he said furiously to his daughter. One and all, they were after her money—his money. One look, he shouted, and he could smell them a mile off. Hangers-on. Yahoos. Parasites.
When Jessica, at the end of June, announced that she was engaged to one of them—a young Frenchman named Hubert Ramage, whom she had known for little more than two weeks—Mr. de Vrais granted to the suitor a short interview and at the end of it announced that any further communication between the couple would be made over his dead body. On a cool, September morning she rose rose early, left a conclusive little note for her father, carried her suitcases down to the car and drove into St. Helier to catch the boat to St. Malo. When her father read the note, it said, she would be married to Hubert. Unfortunately she took the family jewels with her, in case her marriage didn’t work out…