LATEST FICTION

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 138, 7 December 1929, Page 21

LATEST FICTION

A VARIED LOT

"Time is a Gentleman" is by Charles Thomson (London: Cassell and Co.; through Whitcombe and Tombs), and is a very fine story of the Philippines embodied In this interesting novel of Mackenzie Duell's attempt to solve the nirstery attaching to tho death of hisf- ™- He goea t0 tho islands with ins Unuese servant, not ouly to clear his father's name, but to work an_ estato long left derelict, iai p u , hi s invaluable Chinese attendant, shares the hazards ?* t-he triP with Mackenzie, and has a little private war of his own. Xt is natural that the white man and his staunch little Chinese companion (the friend of his father) should enter into the adventure with a spirit of camaraderie seldom experienced between two J?. eu ?f different races. An Irishman, t~: aac > comes into the story wih his ward, a charming girl named t, it is a foregone conclusion that she and Mackenzio should meet and fall in love. Feliza exercises all the prerogatives of her sex to the discomfiture of her admirer. There is drama at sea, tragedy ashore, and romance among the- palms; iv fact, all the ingredients for an absorbing novel for adaptation for the film. Mackenzie has f ew England ideals who sails the seas to save his father's name and finish a feud. Tai Fu's words to his family on _his return to America call for quotation. He says, "For the vitality of & race rests not upon the rushing vigour of its youth, its inventions, its military strength, or its wealth but upon the calmness and fortitude of its soul Discipline your desires, that the b. uS ht day of your life may be unclouded and its dimmer evening lighted £/. the twin stars of Memory and Friendship." J A Yorkshire My3tery. Col. Eugleden was not only an exGovernor of a great English prison, but an archeologist and interested in particular m ancient castles. When in a little North Country town ho went put after dinner to see the local castle py moonlight, he told the hall porter of his hotel that he might be late coming back. He was not seen alive by his fnends after that night. His body was found, however, in the Brown Pool, and how it got there is tho mystery through which that ingenious storyteller, J. S. Fletcher, conducts his readers in "The Wrist Mark" (LondonHerbert Jenkins). There is plenty of brisk action in "The Wrist Mark," and an unexpected ending to the mystery. Lipstick and Powder Puff. In "The Riddle of the .Emeralds," Mrs. Phillip Champion de Crespigny (London: Cassells), the author has taken rather a different line from any of her other books.. She has delved into "mystery," so popular just now. Humphrey Goodlake, a bachelor verging on middle-age, marries a very young wife, whose permanent and leading characteristics are a'lipstick and powder puff. Soon after the wedding, news is received of the deatli of a cousin, Bertram Goodlake. He has written about some extremely valuable emeralds which ho had just purchased, and mentions the possibility of his being murdered; therefore he asks them to look to his secretary for explanation, but he made no mention of the name of the secretary. Then follows news of his murder. The trail of detection is a most confused one, and many characters aro introduced! Suspicion is cast here and there, but the interest is well sustained throughout. . . & A Clever Plot. "The Oxford Murders," by Adam Broome (London: Geoffrey Bles), contains only two and a half murders the half because the third attempt by the elusive criminal was unsuccessful but they were sufficient to arouse in inhabitants of Oxford a sense of insecurity which did not vanish as the daya went by, and nobody was brought to book. . The deaths of two gentlemen of pronounced scholastic attainments and a few enemies, had particular bearing on the lives of two young students, Barbara Playford and Reggie Crofts, for not only were- they the last persons to see tlie first victim alive, but Dr. Playford, Barbara's uncle, is the man whom the murderer seeks as his third victim. An unusual twist i 3 given to the story by the residence at Oxford of an African prince, whose arrival with two wives and much in. the way of impedimenta, makes an amusing first chapter. The solution of the mystery of the murders is also novel, and the reader is given glimpses of life on board an African;bdund ship, and of conditions in some parts of that Continent by one who has possibly experienced both himself. If in just one or two places "The Oxford Murders" is apt to be a little tedious, there is, from cover to cover, a freshness of plot and outlook which amply compensates.