SOME RECENT FICTION

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 24, 23 October 1920, Page 3

SOME RECENT FICTION

/'Double'' Life." . '' ' Those of my renders who Temem'bei that lively story, 'Jft. Grant Richards'* > 'Cavin'ro,"« and its successor, the nlmoul equally popular "Rittersweet," will, turn With very ploasuruble' anticipation to the .opening'-chapter'of the publisher-author's latest novel, "Double Life" (Grant Rich. ■ ords, I>er Vi'hitcombe and Tombs). Mr. Richards seems to have a partiality for the gambling instinct as a fictional motif. In "Caviare" h6 gave lis ,sonie highly entertaining, and not uninstruetivo pictures of life-at Monte Carlo, and some equally diverting scenes in the financial whirlpool of : Wall Street. In "Doublt Life" he provides some of the liveliest and most fascinating pictures of English racing—and descriptions of turf 'speculation—which wo linva had since the Rood old days-'of/Whyto Melville and Hawlej Smart. He is not, as wero thoso two fiivourfTe writers of the Victorian period, eo "miifth concerned with the' racehorse, his' training, \nnd the way he ii ridden— 'although even hero ho can be quite astonishingly 'technical—as with those, who regard the "noble quadruped," as Pieref, Eganand the sporting novolists of the past used to call the liorss—as a moans to making ■ mpnej'7-or losing it. Also, he lias had the original idea, which, 60 fai as I .can Teniember, never oocniTed to the late, and by a big public of his own, .the, much-lamented ; Mr. Nat .Gould, of makings the "punter" who is the leading figure ' in hKs story, a lady, Mrs. Olivia Pemberton, the wifo of a middleaged and somewhat stodgy novelist, of the Clinyjes • (Inrvice type, is tired of liei humurnm life. Visiting Newmarket in comnanv or"hor husband, who is in search ot local colour, for his next story, she becomes'fa'scinated by the idea that sho may make money by backing horses, her special objective lieing a motor-car. Soon slie is not only backing torses for small amounts, but actually purchasing a promising colt, which she confides to the care of a very gentlemanly trainer, who, luckily for the- lady, is ai honest, as he is agreeably mannered. The heroine is amazingly yell favoured by fortune and is soon betting in hundreds instead of modest "fivers," transacting her gambling biisines? through a'firm of turf accountants, hoing horo again specially fortunate in with honest people. Mr. Richards is singularly successful in makihg us accent as quite crediblo tho devices by which the bidy conceals her turf including her ownership of a. raceliorse, from her unsuspecting hubby. Once or twice shn k perilously near detection, but the ico never breaks, and so the story proceeds until we leave tho heroine, 'in tho.last chapter, breaking the newn to the stodgy but.amiable Mr. Pemberton that she has •inrrowly escaped owning .a Derby winner, and that «he is retiring from tho Sold of racing speculation with the nice round sum of i:!fl,OflO on tho right side of the ledger. .There is an interpolated and subsidiary episode, at Monte Carlo, where the Pembertons indulge in separate and ioint "flutters," but. for tho. most prj't. "Double Life" is as strictly concerned with, the so-called "Sjpnrt of Kings" and with the feverish delights and- occasional wop? of; the ■ "I'mpi-niV ; W even H>c lute Afr. Gould i *r>r:lfl have desired. It is an a-tonisliing-J 1 ly clever and vastly amusing story. Mr.;-, ..Richards .has a crisp, effective style, and .. I he has evidently ' gone to considerable I'

pains to master the technicalities of the racing and butting world. It is lo Iw hoped that his amount, of Mrs. Pemberton's wonderful good-luck, a good luct in her case, backed by no small natural shrewdness and plenty of pluck at thoright moment, may not induce n host of married ladies to imngino that tho.y cmi go and do likewise. Now that a new mlii'i of Mr. George Moore.'f, "Esthw Waters," in which quite another side of tho betting craze is exposed, has recently been published, it. would not be a hail idea if the moralists wore to ine/st upon a perusal of "Double Life" being follower! by .1 study of Mr. Mooio's famous story. Where Mr. Richards is specially successful is in his clever analyses of the heroine's alternating emotions of elation and depression, as she score* KucrSssive . misses or bits at the target of fortune. In "Double Life," Mr. Richards has given the., world one of tho best racing ! novels ever written. ; "Sweethearts Unmet." Bcrta Ruck (Mrs. Oliver Onions! at-' . ways introduces us to some exceptionally ■ ploasant people in the' stories which, ap. patently, flow from her pen so easily, . and which appear at mic.li aatonisbingiy short intervals. In her latest stoTy, "Sweethearts Unmet" ' (Fodder una Stoughton, per Whitcombe and Tombs), sho takes two lonely young Londoners, of [ opposite sexes—that goes without, saying 1 —and shows how a kindly fete brings . them together, and after sporting with them a.little, with that, touch of malicious humour Dame Fortune to fre-nn-ntlvd'-oplavß, play; the good angel, and duly leaves thorn very Happily mated. ' The story-is told in alternating extracts from diaries kept by the two chief characters, the author winding up the oleasaiit littlo comedy with some sensible re marks on tho duty of everybody to bring the' "right" young people ' together. Plenty of sentiment, and much whole- ' some humour, together with some genial ' philosophy, can be found and enjoyed in ' "Sweethearts Unmet." < "The.Rod Seal." ■ I "Tho Bed Seal," by Katharine New- ' lin Burt iHoughton, Mifflin, Co,, N.Y., ■ per Whitcombe and Tombs), is a very . good specinion of ultra-soiuwtionnl lietion, in : which the supernatural is strongly suggested, only, to resolve it- s self, into . ingeniously-concocted welo- f drama. There is a haunted houso in a j lonely part of the pine belt of North 1 Carolina, an .unliable widow with a- sec- t ret, and a red-haired governcss-eompan- t ion. who meets with jomo perfectly hair- i raising experiences. Also, there is a I clever young detective, who, although ho ( falls in love.with the governess, suspects ; her, for a time, of being a quite, diaboli- j cat criminal. ■/ Tho villain of tho piece i is an older, arid very wicked red-haired | lady, who bobs up mysteriously- in the. ] dead of, night v iroin hidden passages and | cupboards, and, who, in the lonsr'run, • . turns out to be the governess-heroine's > mother, who is in- search of n hidden . store of immensely valuable jewels stolen ' from an' ancient Eussinn shrine. In the last'chapter'the mystery is cleared ; up, the wicked mother takes poison, and the red-haired daughter's character is ( cleared. ■ Villainy, in fact, is vanquished, and virtue is triumphant. For lovers of, sensation, a Tery readable story. "The Call of the Offshore Wind." Mr. Ilalph Pake, the author of '"The ' Call of the Offshore Wind" (Constable' and Co., per Australasian Publishing Company and Whitcombe and Tombs), • has made-a'special study of the hardy : seafatiug folk who live on the coast of 'Maine. Mostly, in tho past, he has written short stories, but no now gives ' us a full-length novel descriptivo of the ] exciting adventures which. befall y<*;iig ' Dudley Fenwiclc, tho 6on of an old sail-ing-ship builder aud owner at Spring Haven. . Tho old man has a great contempt for steam, but steam is too much for Him, and, his busiue-s declines to the ' verge of bankruptcy. After the old ; man's - death, young Dudley takes a ''• berth as- first' mate, - and manages to ■

keep the business afloat. He is having a hard struggle when the war comes and .creates a sudden and, insistent demand for sailing craft. The young fellow has to encounter rascality, both in his own ■ family and outside, but he has all the pluck nnd determination of that typical old hard-shell Down-Easter, his father, nnd he not only revives and re-estab-lishes the old' Fenwick shipbuilding yards on sound nnd profit ab'.e lines, but is successful also in a venture of pergonal and purely sentiuioutal interest. There are some line sen picturos in the story, and the rough schooner skippers and mates—reminiscent not ft little of those we met in "Captain Courageous"— arc skilfully and effectively drawn. Quite a good yarn in its own class.