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REVIEWS IN BRIEF *Because It Is Bitter, and Because It Is My Heart Joyce Carol Oates (Dutton, $19.95) The masterful realist at the peak of her powers. Comparisons with Balzac, Dickens, and Hardy are not farfetched. A
*The Burden of Proof Scott Turow (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $22.95) Although The Burden of Proof lacks the surefire thriller devices that helped make Presumed Innocent such a commanding piece of storytelling, readers who persevere will be rewarded. B
*CNN: The Inside Story Hank Whittemore (Little, Brown, $19.95) Ostensibly an account of the first all-news network, but really the story of its swaggering helmsman, Ted Turner. (See review.) C
*Family Pictures Sue Miller (Harper & Row, $19.95) An ordinary Chicago family with an autistic child-a loving, suffering family that endures and tries to learn. A
*Family Sins & Other Stories William Trevor (Viking, $18.95) Masterful short fiction by the prolific Irish writer. A
*Going Back to the River Marilyn Hacker (Vintage, paperback, $9.95) No contemporary poet writes so well of the comedy of love as Marilyn Hacker, and none can approach her inviting combination of relaxation, wit, and formality. A-
*An Inconvenient Woman Dominick Dunne (Crown, $19.95) Dunne's most recent chronicle of well-heeled heels, this time in Hollywood. B
*Letters of Katherine Anne Porter Selected and edited by Isabel Bayley (Atlantic Monthly Press, $29.95) Porter's story unfolds, incompletely and fitfully, in this collection culled from the thousands of letters she wrote during her long lifetime. B
*Norma Shearer Gavin Lambert (Knopf, $24.95) A sympathetic but shrewd portrait of the MGM star. A
*Rolling Stone Magazine: The Uncensored History Robert Draper (Doubleday, $19.95) A brisk and passionate account of the magazine's tumultuous 23 years. B
*Small Victories: The Real World of a Teacher, Her Students & Their High School Samuel J. Freedman (Harper & Row, $22.95) An exhaustive, unsentimental report from the battle-scarred regions of American education. A
*Walter Winchell Michael Herr (Knopf, $18.95)In his first book of fiction, Michael Herr (Dispatches) creates a new form-the screenplay as novel. A
*What Lisa Knew: The Truths and Lies of the Steinberg Case Joyce Johnson (Putnam, $22.95) With this book, Johnson does what she wishes the courts had done: She tries Hedda Nussbaum as well as Joel Steinberg. Unfortunately, her case is built on conjecture, speculation, and some ill will. C
*Wildlife Richard Ford (Atlantic Monthly Press, $18.95) What begins as a wise, humane, and disarmingly simple novel of domestic distress soon grows discouragingly dull. C+
ALSO NOTED
*Apollo: The Race to the Moon Charles Murray and Catherine Bly Cox (Touchstone, paperback, $12.95) Tales of the unheralded men and women-controllers, engineers, and scientists-behind the Apollo moon missions.
*Berries Robert Berkley (Fireside, paperback, $14.95) A visual delectation with some stunning recipes (pistachio-and-orange souffle with hot blueberry sauce) and some horrific ones (squid ink fettucine with blackberry cream sauce).
*The Golden Orange Joseph Wambaugh (Morrow/Perigord Press, $19.95) Murder in the Newport Beach yacht-and-bikini set. The first novel in more than five years from Wambaugh (The Onion Field, The Choirboys).
*Homeboy Seth Morgan (Random House, $19.95) Touted as a ''ball-and-chain ballad of bloodletting, blackmail, and babydolls'' and set in San Francisco's seamy drug- racked underworld. Morgan, a former strip-joint barker and ironworker, won top honors in the 1978 PEN American Prisoners' Writing Contest.
*Listening Woman Tony Hillerman (Harper, paperback, $4.95) A classic Hillerman tale of murder steeped in Navajo history and lore.
*No Resting Place William Humphrey (Delta, paperback, $10.95) A novel about a Cherokee boy on the Trail of Tears by the author of Home From the Hill.
*The Trial of Socrates I.F. Stone (Anchor Books, paperback, $9.95) A maverick journalist's re-reading of a maverick philosopher.
*A Voice Crying in the Wilderness: Notes From a Secret Journal Edward Abbey (St. Martin's Press, $14.95) Aphorisms from the late environmental sage.
