SOME RECENT FICTION.

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 62, 7 December 1918, Page 11

SOME RECENT FICTION.

"On the Kneos of the Gods." Miss Mabel Brookes, the author of "On the Knees of the Gods"'{Melbourne, Melville, Mullen, and Slade), is.an Australian writer whose first..book, "Broken Idols," gavo a very pleasant description of war-time .life hi Egypt; In her new story, Miss Brookes introduces us to a young Australian lady whose husband is at the front. Proceeding to join him in England, she meets on board, ship another gentleman, who wins her admiration by his presence of mind when, the steamer is attacked' hy a Hun submarine in the Mediterranean. Ariiwd in England, the heroine becomes interested in the love affairs of a young relation, Marjorie Ashdown, who becomes engaged to a worthless eov.sin .who, before going to the front and being —invalided .home through .shell-shock, lias led a;.somewhat disreputable'', life'.: liy the'end this somewhat unwholesome' person has intermit- , tent attacks of insanity,, which assume 1 a peculiarly unpleasant, form; A young ' Australian 'squatter', an ex-repre-j'itativo cricketer, now si courageous soldjer, rescues Marinrie- from her half-mad'lover, and the last chapter' foreshadows a double wedding, the heroine, now n widow, finding consolation in the love of her old and •faithf-.il friend of the sub- : marine incident, and. Marinrie marrying ■ the Australian. The story, includes, many interesting pictures of .life, in England I during the war period. " . 1 "Lon'j Live .the King." Mary Roberts Einehart is an American I novelist who has a bi~ public in ber own , country, and it is not surprising that . English publishers should now be intro- [■ ducine her work 1o readers on.the ensr- ) evi.i side of the Atlantic. A recent addi- • (ion to John Murray's Imperial Library ,' is Miss Rinehart's latest novel, "Long ( '■ Live the King". (John Murray; per Whitcombe and Tombsl Tl 'is a well-written romance in the Ruritnnian genre, deal- • ing, as, it does, with (he strange experiences and adventures of a -little lad, ' the Crown Prince of Livonia, a more or i less imaginary European State, where political conditions are reminiscent of those of Buril.anin and Granstark. The ' story is packed full of exciting incident's, a highly sentimental and romantic interest being- provided in the lovo j story of ii Livonian princess, -.who casts the eyes o! affection Upon a handsome young man far less "wohlgebornen"than • herself. , A secret sooiety. of.- terrorists ■ of tho pre-war Bolshevik variety provides a liberal supply of sensation, and a. humorous element is introduced by a 'little American boy whose father owns . a "scenic railway." and with whom the lonelv little r>rino?let forms a secret and ; fast friendship. Tho story is told with ; an engaging vivacity, and'is vfiry'read- : able. j "An English Rose," , ! Mr, David Lyall's latest novel. "An , English Rose" (Cassell and Co.; per Whitcome and Tombs), is a war story. The ■ heroine,. Cicely Mnnham, goes out to France with her rich aunt, Lady Winyard, to do. work with the French Bed [ Cross. In the course of her hospital work Cicely meets a young Englishman, | Storing, who is serving 'with the Foreign . Legion, :also an Irishman, of markedly anti-British sympathies,. named Dennis Kane, who is in the same ■ regiment. Steering is fatally wounded by a bomb, Cicely having a narrow escape close by. \ She "consents to a death-bed marring?, all unaware that her "husband" is an .' English peer. After Steering's death the wife, who is a 'wife'only''in name,, takes over the' management iof . 'her mother-in-law's estate, and eventnnlly goes to Ireland on a ..visit. Present during the Dublin Rebellion,' she is'wounded by a Sinn Fein bullet, and -reeuper- ! ates in a country, district, where Kane, who is nono other than The O-Eouiko, a man of good family, has'an estate. The story ends with Cicely engaged, to thehandsome. Irishman, who, by this time ' convinced that the cause 'of the Empire is of more importance that the alleged woes of the "distressful country,"' has determined to enlist' in the, Irish Guards, and do his bit under the British flag, '■ Cicely .returning ..to war work, and the ..marriage to take place when peace is declared. Mr. Lyall's. simple,' direct style is well suited to the theme ho has chosen.