3 MAY 1930, Page 32

THE ANCIENT WHEEL. By Barbara Goolden. (Chap- man and Hall.

7s. 6d.)—A really distinguished novel this, in which cleanly drawn characters who are recognisably human go through tangled experiences as significant as they are, in a sense, ordinary. If one were to call this study of contemporary society Galsworthian it would be in praise, and because it has much of the solidity and shrewd warmth of the famous novelist and playwright. In addition, it has a crispness and delicacy all its own. The hero and heroine, both persons of conscience and both very independent, fight their difficult way to each other against other people's feelings, convention and circumstance. The book is not a romance, but a clear- sighted delineation of character in action, and of men and women of the present day in rela • _on both to each other and to society.