Bailey might not have great intelligence or abilities, but his whole aim, thought and study was that of the born leader--to look out for himself; and he did it with that born-leader's confidence and intensity that draws along the ordinary uncertain man, who soon confuses his own interest and his own safety with that of the leader.

Bruccoli University of Pittsburgh Press 1981
James Gould Cozzens: A Checklist Compiled by James B. The central figures in his books are primarily professional middle-class white men — assistant district attorney Abner Coates in The Just and the Unjust doctor George Bull in The Last Adam Episcopal priest Ernest Cudlipp in Men and Brethren U. She died on January 30 1978.

Despite initial critical acclaim his popularity came gradually. He is often grouped today with his contemporaries John O'Hara and John P. Cozzens was a critic of modernism and of realism more leftist than his own and he was quoted in a featured article in Time as saying "I can't read ten pages of Steinbeck without throwing up.