One too Many. 3 vols. (Saunders and Otley.)—Objectors to the
ultra- sensationalism of modern novels are gravely informed that "truth is stranger than fiction." This answer is held to be so sufficient and has been so often repeated of late, that writers have taken heart of grace, with an evident conviction that the stranger their fiction the closer its resemblance to truth. Here we have an intended murder falling short of completion only by the semi-miraculous restoration to life of the c offined and buried victim, together with an actual completed murder, a suicide, a miserable case of insanity, lasting for years together, with several minor horrors, just to enable the hero not to marry the woman he loves, who loves him, and who waits for the merest word to become his devoted wife! At this point the real story begins, but as we have no intention of tracing out its development, we shall content ourselves with noting that the (unmarried) heroine, although becoming continu- ally stunned, bereft of her cherished hopes, and otherwise morally blighted, shows a power of surviving highly commendable, and suffi- cient to set up half-a-dozen slighted damsels in mental fortitude. One word more—has it ever occurred to the author that the title of his book may be ominous
Previous page
