SOME RECENT FICTION.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1716, 5 April 1913, Page 9

SOME RECENT FICTION.

■ THEIR YESTERDAYS, Harold ®ell Wriglit is deservedly ono of the most popular American novelists, and'unlike some writers who have achieved a good reputation with the public, his work shows no falling-off in quality as each new story appears. "The 1 Shepherd of the Hills," and that specially fine story, "The Winning of Barbara 'Worth" ■are now followed by "Their Yesterdays" (George Robertson and Co.), a story which is calculated to further increase Mr. Wright's,popularity. In its construction there is .a x far-away resemblance to "Ik tilaTvel's" famous "Reveries of a Bachelor,", but Mr. Wright' may fairly claim originality for his treatment of a-love story which is replete with grace, dignity, pathos, and a sentiment which is never tainted by. sickliness. It, is 1 the story of a'man and-a woman,-traced from childhood to middle age, in a series of chapters in which, under the general heading of the .."Thirteen Truly Great Things of Life," the. principal factors in the making of -humanhappiness and misery are set forth and expounded in- a spirit of gentle and pleasant philosophy. Thero is enough of the essayist's style in the .book to make tho, story much more thought-compelling tlfan the ordinary novel, and enough of the fictional and sentimental to relievo the narrative from any suspicion of being a collection of essays. Where the author deserves the highest credit is for the ability with which his story exalts pure unselfish love, the striving after high ideals, the -honour of the home, and the supremo glory of the wifely and motherly positions. It is difficult to overpraise the combined delicacy and dignity of the literary style of "Their Yesterdays." This is a book a lonf: way, a very long way, out of tho common, and marks its author as a writer immeasurably above tho ordinary storyteller, the clever-weaver of fiction, whoso only object is to amuse. In "Their Yesterdays" there are passages of real literary beauty, arid the thoughts enshrined are well. worthy of so dainty. a setting. "Their Yesterdays" should confirm and greatly a<dd to Mr. Wright's already high reputation. CHESS FOR A STAKE. Har<>l<s Vallings's "Chess for a Stake"(George. Bell and Sons, per Whitcombe's) is a well-written story with Bath and Somerset country for its background. The novelist traces the lovo affairs of four very pleasant and young people, but the story is chiefly remarkable for its strongly-drawn pictures of life, at a big private school where tho nephew of ono of tho heroes is treated, with ingeniously studied cruelty by an assistant-master who is his uncle's rival. There is also a merciless portrait of a selfish mother, upon whose fears and ambitions tho villainous Jago Polioli'ele, for a time, works successfully. , the' man pays. A. Aplin's "Tho Man Pays" (George Bell and Sons, per Whitcombe's) is a crudely sensational story, mainly of tho turf and pugilism. The chief character, Sir Reginald Attwood, is quito in tho once approved-style of tho London Journal and transpontine melodrama. The story is packed full of sensational incident, but .the plot is frightfully stagey and the dialogue very stilted. [Several other novel notices held over.l