An American Duchess. By Arabella Kenealy. (Chapman and Hall. 6s.)—The
reader will suffer a good deal of disappointment if he takes up this book thinking, on the faith of the title, that he is about to have presented to him a subtle analysis of the feelings of an American girl who has married an English Duke. The "American Duchess" as a fact ceases to be a Duchess about half- way through the book, and from the beginning is only used as a foil to the virtuous heroine. A weak point in the plot is that the heroine, by the simple device of assuming a wig and blue spectacles, becomes entirely unrecognisable. These properties, indeed, enable the hero, who is still deeply attached to her, to spend hours in her presence every day for months Without recognising her as the woman he loves. Apart from this obvious absurdity, the book is a good example of the lighter kind of society novel, and the pictures of "smart" life in London are on the whole well done, although drawn a little in the fashion of the scene painter,—that is, with very broad touches of light and shade. Miss Kenealy can, however, do better work than this, and we hope that she will not again condescend to the banality of allowing her heroine to appear in a disguise which is so unconvincingly impenetrable.
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