Jottings

Radio Record, Volume V, Issue 18, 13 November 1931, Unnumbered Page

Jottings

" [TX "The Road? Mr. Warwick Deeping develops his theme after his oy well-known fashion. Very’ ing@pous and convincing are the garad@acr with his sensitive spirit; the proud, shy girl who plays a large part in his life, her energetic mother who makes so gallunt a stand to keep the Mill House tea gatdens goings, and her sister, the downright Rhoda. The great road that winds its way past their doors is an integral part of their lives, and finally the clattering cars that pass up and down spell tragedy for Rachel and the life she might have lived, for an accident leaves her maimed and helpless. Mr. Deeping paints the interwoven reactions of the spiritual and material factors of. his tale, which will add to his-already established literary repntation. = Me ARTHUR LAMBUON is a well- ’ Jnown collator of notable events in the history of crime, and his latest effort in this direction entitled "Causes Celebre" ig an enthralling successor to "Thou Shalt Do No Murder," for those interested in that particular aspect of the psychology of the race. In the selection made by the chronicler, there is a wealth of detail and a convincing method of recounting the case for and against the protagonists that fascinate attention. The breaking of the moral code is not confined to what is known as the lower class, and in Mr. Lambton’s little list figure historical personages who loomed large in the society of their day: ‘the Marquise de Bhinvilliers, Count WKonigsmark, the Due du Choiseul,, and the Duchess of Kingston, Another section gives the history of many unsolvable crimes, among them the Great Coram Street and Burton Crescent mysteries, This is,a book that will orove singularly a@uring to those interested-and they de many-in the seamier side of life. s a * TPHE late Sir Hall Caine has left material for a Life of Christ. To this he devoted many years of his long life, and has left innumerable manuscripts and notes in relation to what he cousidered would be his magnum opus. Unfortunately his life ended before he put his collated data into book form, and this work has been undertaken by representatives of the late writer, who in his lifetime devoted a never-faltering industry to the great biography in which his heart was bound up. Study of Biblical history was the great enthusiasm of:the mind.and heart of the accomplished novelist,.and it may be taken for granted that all classes of thinkers, be they inside or outside the pale of the church, will be keenly interested in the book when eventually it is published.

~_ Miss AGATHA CHRISTIE continues her industrious and thrilling output of ingeniously concocted tales of terror, Her latest contribution to the literature of crime is entitled "he Sittaford Mystery,,’? an absorbing account of a mysterious Kkilling, In all the circle surrounding the unfortunate naval officer who is the yictim the most unlikely person proves -to be the criminal, and the extremely unexpected denouement is related in quite the best melodramatic munner of a practised sensationalist. % * * ME. PERCY BROEMEL, who is evidlently a great reader of the penny papers, is a firm believer in the dictum of some editor that "woman is always news." Tle seems to have béen dipping into accounts of Woman in her various activities for a long time past, and the result is "Ageless Woman," which, with its index, would be excessively useful io the writers of balf-column "woman stories" in the popular Press, If Mr. Broemel’s book appears to have no particular plan, his aim at any rate is -all-embracing, Starting with a dissertation on Eve, he wanders through the centuries, retailing a story here, un anecdote there, of some queen, great lady, noteworthy or notorious, of bluestockings and singers, and the English actresses of the 17th and 18th centuries. & at * A DOMESTIC tyrant’s decline and fall is the theme of a remarkably fine first novel, in which Dr. A. d. Cronin, who has just retired from practice, displays a mastery of English prose and an ease of narration which Will surprise those who have met him only in the pages of his official report on first aid in coal mines. The novel is "Flatter’s Castle." James Brodie is the hatter, and the castle is the eccentric and pretentious house that he builds for himself in a Scottish provincial town in the ’seventies. Tie is a man of huge body and infinitesimal mind, having room in it for only one idea, his own importance. Consequently he becomes a domestic tyrant of terrifying lgyitality, sacrifichepa ad ing his wife, his, mo

his two daughters to The collapse, first fi and moral, of this ¢ unfolded by. Dr.. Cr of detail that callg prisingly wide ob of industrial Scot, his experience of The fearful end ter, who commi tolerable slavevanity, rather has failed to that is his ain} of the story.