qualities recommend them to the young reader, but there is often a more subtle element which appeals to the developing idealism of the adolescent eager to reform the world, that is the hope, even the prophecy, that if man cannot learn to live happily with man on earth he may discover how in the rarified air of another planet. Utopia was crowded out of the South Seas about the end of last century, but thanks to Science fiction, appears to have set up house in outer space. Among recent publications there is The Star Raiders, by Donald Suddaby, suitable for junior forms, and for the seniors, Islands in the Sky, by Arthur C. Clarke, The Kraken Wakes, by John Wyndham, and Out of the Silent Planet, by C. S. Lewis. But only the best contemporary authors come anywhere near Forty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, by Jules Verne, or The Time Machine, by H. G. Wells and his grim little drama The Invisible Man. The next two books I recommend with reservations. They are among the best examples of another kind of book which has gained great popularity but little distinction in recent years—career books. On is Sue Barton—Student Nurse, by Helen Dore Boylston, and the other is The Two Cadets, by Ian Scott. These will undoubtedly appeal to the girl who has ideas about nursing and the boy who can't wait to join the navy, but I'm not sure that an enthusiastic teenager, about to choose a career, will be able to discount the elements of glamour and romance which both these books possess. Seventeenth Summer, by Maureen Daly, can hardly be called a career book, but like them, it is a book written for adolescents about adolescents. It is the story of a seventeen year old girl (American) ‘going steady’ with a boy for a summer. It is skilfully written with great sensitivity and acute insight into the thoughts and feelings of some, but only some, adolescent girls. When it first appeared it caused quite a controversy. It certainly is an unusual book but I feel it has somehow missed its mark. It may have been intended for seventeen year old daughters but it seems more suitable for their mothers instead. There are very few New Zealand books written for intermediate readers. Between The Book of Wiremu and the adult books the field is wide open to any would-be New Zealand authors. But there is one novel. Drovers Road, by Joyce West, a New Zealander, which I recommend heartily for both seniors and juniors. Published in London in 1953 and reprinted in 1954, it is as the dust-jacket says, ‘a tale of family life on a New Zealand sheep station’, well written in a fresh and natural style. It has all the qualities that make Charlotte's Web so attractive—plenty of humour, a little tragedy, excitement, but above all, very human and convincing characters and an adult treatment of human relationships. It will be immediately appreciated by the young New Zealander who has developed any feelings at all for his own country, and for those who have not, it should be a set book.

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