SOME RECENT FICTION

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2687, 5 February 1916, Page 9

SOME RECENT FICTION

"MAKING MONEY." The clever American, novelist, Owen Johnson, who made a hit with his college story, "Stover at Yale," and whose later novel, "the Salamander," was such-a merciless exposure of the more sordid and unhealthy side of theatrical life in New York, now gives us, in "Making Money" (Frederick A. Stokes Company; per D. 0. Ramsay and Comipany), a powerfully-written and convincing study, of Wall Street speculation tad speculators. The hero, a young fellow fresh from 'the university, resists the desire of his father, a wealthy but conservative textile .manufacturer, that he should go into ihe paternal business. The old man is disappointed, but gives Crocker, jun.'; fifty thousand dollars to start in that bigger, game of money making, and. money losing, which is played par excellence on Wall Street. The young man joins a firm of brokers and makes one or two lucky hits on his own account, becoming engaged to the c-lder. daughter of one of the giants of finance, Dan Drake, who has a great liking for him. Doris Drako, however, inherits flier mother's selfish regard for money, and money first and foremost, whilst on his side the hero discovers t'Hat it is Patsie Drake, the ypunger daughter, an- unselfish, jolly girl, whom he really loves.- The engagement is broken off, and Doris marries a-very wealthy man, whilst Crocker, by this time overwhelmed with the ■gambling fever, becomes involved, through Drake,, in colossal speculations which, though temporarily, successful, eventually "ruin Patsie's father. He could still be saved were Mrs! Drake to ,come to the rescue, but the wife refuses to sacrifice the millions' her husband had made over to her in the years of his financial triumphs, and poor Patsie's cheerfully-made sacrifice of her small fortune is unavailing. Drake is killed in a so-called 1 street "accident"— in reality, it is a case of suicide —and .the hero, who has taken up engineering and foresworn !the hectic delights of Wall Street for ever, marries Patsie, and goes into his father's * business. The story constitutes a powerful indictment of the devious and often very dirty tricks by which the modern "robber barons" of the American financial world plunder each other. Also, it throws, some curious and instructive lights upon the utter selfishness of a certain class of American women. Crocker, or "Bojo," as his friends call him, is a fine.young fellow, whose natural instincts of honour and loyalty to :bis friends' not even the noxious air of WaU Street can-kill. But Dan Drake, the resourceful, good-natured, but cynically .unscrupulous financier, is real hero' of this dramatic and interest-compelling story.

"GOSSAMER." "George A. Birmingham's" (Canon Hannay) laitest novel, "Gossamer" (Mdthuen and Co., per D. 0. Ramsay and Co.), is 'a very different kind of story from "Spanish Gold," "Lalage's Lovers,'' and other of Mr. Birmingham's v previous -productions. • For once, the background is not Ireland, the principal scenes being laid on an Atlantic liner, in New York, and in London, and the story itself being more a philosophical and ironically humorous commentary on tho life of the present day —or the days just before the war—than a novel in the ordinary sense of the term. The principal characters are an. Irish baronet, naturally a Unionist, a Nationalist M.P., a jovial fellow, osten-sibly-an ardent champion of "the cause,'' hut at heart an equally ardent and most L pushful financial adventurer, a young inventor, the M.P.'s brother, and last, but certainly not' least, a German financier, an unnaturalised alien, named Ascher, and his wife. When war broke out Archer' finds himself, inva very awkward position, which the author analysis with great . dexterity. In a way Mr. Birmingham sedms to have had in view a defence of, the capitalist class, but he. is more, convincing and certainly irore amusing when the genial Gorman is on the scene. Tho dialogue of the story -is delightfully fresh and humorous, but underlying all the humour, which'is welcome enough in these grey days, r goodness only knows, there is a deep vein of thoughtful and penetrating criticism on the realities of life. By all means do not neglect to read "GossaJner." , "THE GREY DAWN." "The Grey Dawn," by Stewart Edward White (Hodder and l Stoughton, per S. and W. Mackay), is a vigorously written story of life in.San Francisco in the early days of the gold fever, tho exact period being a little later than that of' Mr. White's previous story, "Gold." It is San Francisco of thoearlier 'fifties, which is now described by Mr. White, and no more picturesque setting could be desired than the youthful metropolis of the Golden States, a city of adventurers of all nations, of gamblers, ruffians of all kinds, and a city, too, of brave men and women, hardy pioneers, who had cheerfully thrown off tho shackles of a commonplace existence in the Eastern States and had made -their way cither along tho dismal prairie trail or by way of fever-stricken Panama, io tho Land of Promise. It is with tho' struggle botwoen tho criminal and rowdy clement, and that numerically small but determined band of citizens who Tvcre known as "Tho Vigilantes," that Mr. White's story is mainly concerned. And a- very exciting story it is, brimful of dramatic incidents, and containing many well and strongly-drawn characters. It was a long, stern, and very arduous fight which the "Vigilantes" had to wage ...against the forces of disorder aflddown-„

right evil, but in the end tfliey won, and tho story of the fight and its conclusion was very well worth the telling.

"THE SECRET SEAPLANE." •When, through the machinations of a- wicked' German .princo, Von Kohi, and his equally villainous friend, Frederick Lodz, an Anglicised Hun, the happy-go-luoky young Oxford undergraduate, Lothian, who is the hero of Mr. Guy Thome's story, "Tho Secret Seaplano" (Hodd'er and Stoughton, per S. and W. Maokay), is found guilty and sentenced to six months' imprisonment for theft, the experienced reader knows full well that before the last chapter is reached, the two Huns will have very much the worst of it. Lothian finds a good in a college chum, tho son of a great engineer, who invents a marvellous seaplane and gives the hero fresh start in life, in the Secret Service. Lodz is bowled out wirelessing from a mansion on the East Coast, ana by the aid of the wonderful seaplane the hero succeeds in rescuing hisi>lost lady love from a German island, where she is kept in durance vile by the princely and wicked Hun, that individual, like his friend Lodz, meeting a violent and most unpleasant end. The story is told with much spirit, and although of course highly sensational, makes good reading for two or three spare hours.