Grandison Mather. By Sidney Luska. (Cassell and Co., New York.)—The
name that serves as the title of this story is the pseudonym which one Thomas Gardiner adopts when he tries his powers in literature. He has lost his money by the roguery of a trustee, and has to earn his own living, no easy task for a young fellow with no profession. Twenty dollars a week is, it seems, the very smallest pittance on which a man and wife can live in New York. (Obviously, London is a better place for poor gentle- folk.) Thomas Gardiner's efforts to make a livelihood are for a long time unsuccessful. It is no easier to get a foot on the literary ladder on the other side of the Atlantic than it is on this. But just in the nick of time, an appointment turns up in a Govern- ment office, presided over by a ruffian whom, to quote the author's expressive phrase, "you would have known instantly for one of three things,—a burglar, a prize-fighter, or a New York politician." But this will only last for a year. The party in power will go out, and the incomers will make the usual clean sweep of the present occupants of office. To make provision for the evil day, Thomas Gardiner writes a novel, which, with a royalty of 10 per cent., brings him in about $1,500, for a sale of about 15,000 copies. How many novels published at 3s. Gd. (about the equivalent of the dollar when the difference of the two markets is taken into consideration) sell as many in England ? Then he gets .2200 for a second story. America must be a " Tom-Tiddler's ground" for novelists, in spite of the competition of the English pirated books. Of the " surprise " of the book we purposely say nothing. It is an interesting story, especially for the crowd that writes, and the innumerable multitude that hope to write.
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