17 JANUARY 1920, Page 22

READABLE NOVELS.—The Messenger. By Elizabeth Robins. (Hodder and Stoughton. 7s.

net.)—Miss Robins contrives to make the rather threadbare scheme of the governess-spy quite interesting. The account of the visit of the American girl Nan Ellis to the spy in prison is terrible in its realism, and the suicide of the principal character comes quite as a relief.—Second Youth. By Warwick Deoping. (Cassell. 7s. net.)—Kate, the sister of Miles Laverack, the hero, is the most attractive woman character in this book. The scenes in France, where this very remarkable young woman commands the Women's Motor Corps Camp, are worth reading, and there is a thrilling account of an air raid over St. Roman—the pseudonym of which town is a thin disguise for a well-known Headquarters in France.