BOOKS & AUTHORS.

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2325, 5 December 1914, Page 4

BOOKS & AUTHORS.

SOMB (RECENT FICTION. - (By Liber.) k 'THE'RISE! AND GLORY OF THE : WESTELL-BROWNS." The Westell-Browne had not always a hyphenated name. ; Originally they were plain John Westell, a. drajper in a small way of business iu. a middle-class London district, and Martha; Westell (nee Brown), his wife, to her husband always Mother.'But John Westell progresses.. Hβ buys out the boot shop next door, next adds a furniture and crockery department, hardware and stationery annexes, a teem room and so on, and finally blossoms forth into the full glory of a Universal Provider, a Becond and subdued edition of the great Whiteley. • With growth of fortune, his wife, sons and daughters come , to have much larger ideas, a 6 to social position, and so forth; arid gradually the voung Westells, ;by this time Westell-Browns, become Conservatives instead of following the Gladstonian Liberal faith, held dear by their father, read 'The Standard" instead.of the "Daily News," and deserti the Nonconformist- chapel of their youth for a fashionable Anglican church. From living ' 'over the shop." the family migrate to a fashionable suburb and finally to, a country mansion, the father handing over the business to his sons and making a pluoky but unavailing attempt to become a' country gentleman. But the sons, by rash speciK lations, ruin the business and ; suddenly the whole fabric of the Westell-Brown grandeur collapses. The old people face tho trial nobly, the father starting life, afresh again as a draper in a modest way, _ in an unfashionable but thriving district of London, and returning with unfeigned delight to the simple life of his earlier manhood. ■ Such is a brief outline of the story set forth in •Mγ. Paul Neuman's novel, "The Rise and Glory of the Westell-Browns" (Hodder, and Stoughton; per S. and 1 W. Mackay). There is both comedy: and pathos in this excellent story,- a; specially commendable feature of which is the author'e description of the social side of the Nonconformist middle-class life. The honest, industrious draper is an excellent character, but the most successful portrait, into f which the author has put a specially sympathetic touch, is that of the'Kev. Mr. Prescott, the minister of Pembroke Chapel, at which for so many years John Westell,and his wife so humbly and sincerely worship.' The old minister is almost as good as Eome of George' Eliot's portraits in the same genre. A wholesome, welkwritten, in every way admirable story. : "WHAT WILL PEOPLE SAY?" Fashionablo and "fast" life in New York is depicted in Rupert Hughes's new story, "What Will the World Say?" (Harper 8r05.,; per Whitcombe and Tombs). The'heroine, Persis Cabot, daughter of once wealthy Wall Street speculator, is desperately in , love with Harvey Forbes, a young officer, but marries an immensely rich, but dissipated and stupid young man, who makes marriage with the daughter the price of his saving the father from financial ruin. The marriage , , spells misory for Persis, but when-her'old lover, who has inherited a fortune, wishes her to get a divorce and:marry him, she refuses, preferring a secret intrigue... Forbes; however, rovolts, after a time, and once again wants.the lady to divorce |her husband who has become a drunkard. But the reply is still the same, "What will the world say?"Forbes : then renounces her, and the .w.retched'. woman is fatally 'stabbed by ;her liubband, who has only just heard, of., the intrigue which had so long been going on. With her last breath, however, «the wife declares the affair to to have'been an accident, and the wound self-inflicted, ; and the curtain falls. The lifo of the idle and selfish rich, ae it is led in New York and_ Paris and elsewhere,, is described with unsparing realism, a epecial feature,* which accounts., .no doubt; for tne story being advertised as "TheGreat Tango Novel," being an account of the craze'which at one time possessed the New .York plutocrats and - tleir womenfolk .for' participating ,■ in the nightly revels held at the public dancing halls of the city. THE LATEST WILLIAMSON. Mr. and Mrs. C. N: Williamson can always be depended upon for a well-told story, with a good plot, and much 'picturesque local colour. In their latest effort, "A Soldier of the Legion" (Methuen and Co.), the hero is a;ypung and wealthy officer in a crack regiiuentf ■wfto suddenly discovers'that he is not tlio son ofihis ostensible parents, but thet he is really usurping the place-of : a girl for whom, as an infant, ho had been changed by his supposed mother. . He seeks out the girl in. Algeria, makes over his fortune to her, and joins' the famous Foreign Legion. Falling in love with the colonel's daughter, he Tescues her from a scampish explorer, and after a series of exciting adventures in the desert the pair make their way-to Cairo and are married. !fhe romance of an Arab maiden and a handsome Spanish opera singer provides a secondary interest, wEich is ingeniously elaborated, and.the whole story is very read-; able, the description of life in the famous Legion being exceptionally, interesting.-. ■■-... A CERMAN STORY. "Lovers in Exile," by Baroness Hey-' ling, authoress of "The Letters that Never' Reached Him," is the title of a novel published by Mr. Eveleigh Nash. The heroine, a clever German girl of progressive ideas, marries a pompous and egotistical elderly gentleman of the Junker class, and chafes under the ironbound etiquette of her social atmosphere. With a younger and much more brainy man, whom she marries after being divorced from her first husband, she makes acquaintance with the society ways of Berlin officialdom, for which it is easy to see the author has a pro- [ found dislike. Not even the author of i those delightful books, of which "Elizabeth and Her German Garden" was the first and most famous, ever satirised Prussian military and official society more mercilessly than does the author of "Lovers in Exile," the original title of which was "1110 Mihi." THE GIRL FROM THE BACKBLOCKS. Lilian Turner's latest book, "The Girl from the Back-blocks" (Ward, Lock, and Co., per Whitcombe and Tombe), is a pleasantly-written story of the experiences at a Sydney boarding school of a girl of fourteen from the bnckblocks. The education of Joan D'Arcy has been sadly neglected and her gaucheries and slang mako her at first the butt of her fellow-pupils. In tho endi however, she wins their esteem by en. act of noble self-sacrifice. Miss Turner's stories lack the light touch which makes thoso of her eister Ethel (Mrs. Curlewis) so peculiarly attractive, but girls of, say, from eleven to -fifteen should find "A Girl from tho Backblocks" good.holiday 'reading. "THE BROTHER OF DAPHNE," The self-possessed, not to say impudent, young gentleman, whose motorin" and love-making adventures are set forth, so amusingly by, Mr. ' Dornford Yates in "Tho Brother of Daphne" (Ward, Lock and Co.; per Whitcombe and Tombs), reminds mo not a little, of one of Marriott-Wilson's heroes. "Tho Wheels of Chance" -was, I think, the title of tho story. Mr. Yates has cerrtninto, ft .epediriil gift for writing'witty .<Mq£U6a awl m AfsSsiiisnAMymysm.

of Daphne's easy-going brother are vastly amusing. By this time, however, such elegant, frivolous idlers, mere triflers with life, have, I trust, found thoir way to the front. The,illustrationß to Mr. Yates's clever work are so good that it is to be regretted that the artist responsible for them chooses to adopt an indecipherable •. signature, and that his name is not mentioned on the title page. . ■' • "MONA'S MYSTERY MAN." The heroine of Vera C. Dwyerls story, "Mona's Mystery. Man". (Ward, Lock and Co.; per Whitcombe and Tombs), is ■an orphan, a young lady of "a/ Biglilystrung temperament and poetic eensibilities." . She becomes a typist.to a young business man of highly pushful tendencies. The practical side of her new life is at first a sad bore and burden to the romantically-inclined' young lady, but die ends nevertheless by marrying her good-natured, -,sensible employer. The story is an Australian production, the scene being 1 laid in Sydney. Mies Dwyer writes brightly and well, and should do even better wort as her literary gift 1 is further developed. ■'> "ON THE HIGH ROAD.'! Rufus Becket, nouveau riche, buys out the ancestral mansion and eetate of the aristocratic but financially embarrassed Strangtoune, the deal being effected through the agency of a rascal,ly who' practically robs the old baronet : of some twenty ' thousand pounds. ■ The Strangtoun girls are in W water, but young Paul Becket, who is in love with Elinor Strangtoun, and who knows his father has been guilty of some 6hirp practice over his acquisition of the'estate, puts things right. His , marriage to Elinor is at first one ih.-namo only, but tho sterling qualities of the young fellow eventually transform mere respect into deep affection. The story is somewhat'old-faehioned in style, but .■will serve to pass an idle hour or two. ; . "THE JUDGMENT OF EVE." / ■ Feminine psychology is SJiss'May Sinclair's strong'point, and in "The Judgment of Mve, and Other Stories'' (Hut> chinsbft and Co.; per Whitcombe and Tombs), she gives her admirers some keenly ' penetrating glimpses into woman's soul. The title story, a grimly poweriful aind intensely, pathetic, study of the sacrifice of health, comfort, and much , , that makes life worth • living, which: too frequently repeated maternity meanis to i the woman of the poorer middto class, is in its way a little masterpiece: "THE SILVER KINC." "The Silver King," by Alfred Wilson Barrel* (jG. Bell and Sons; per Whitcombe and Tombs), is a highly sensa-. tional fruit readable story, founded on the fanaoAis play of the.same name, by Henry Arthur Jones and Henry Herman. Tbe plot of the melodrama, in which "thfl> author's father scored such a hit as yfilfred Denver, is followed, on the whole, very faithfully, and the story, although somewhat old-fashioned in its tone, should be popular with those ivhfli like sensational fiction. . ./ - Now is the time to rummage your book shelves—or those of your favourite boqkisjbop—for copies of Erckmann Chatrian :l is novels of Alsatian life. In ,''Bverymp|n's Library" you can buy, for- a. mo!<lest .fifteenpence, that excelJenjj. story by. the two Alsatian novelists just namiod, .'.'The; Conscript." It gives you|a picture of -war in the Napoleonio dajrs,,' but its special interest at .present ia that it describes how the .war affeciied. the , Alsatian farmers and peasants. If you read'these stories in ■French altt- the better, but read them in an, EngJish translation rather than ;not atollu' ■ ■