The Incomplete Amorist. By E. Nesbit. (A. Constable and Co
6s.)—Present-day novelists often complain that critics will never allow them to write a book in anything but the manner in which they scored their first success. It does not appear to occur to these authors that it may not always be the critic's captiousness which causes this objection, but the fact that there are many writers who can only do their best work on one model. Of these, " E. Nesbit" is a very striking example. It is impossible to conceive anything more delicately delightful than her children's stories, "The Treasure Seekers," &o., &c. It is also impossible to conceive anything more commonplace and unsatisfactory than her present essay in grown-up fiction. "The Incomplete Amorist" is a gentleman who makes flirtation his object in life, and the use of the word " gentleman" is a kindness which he really does not deserve. The greater part of the story is extraordinarily vulgar, and to that part of it which is not vulgar it is impossible to apply any epithet but that of " stagy." The reconciliation between Betty, the heroine, and her stepfather could only be believed in by people who are in the habit of frequenting Transpontine melo- dramas. But even this lack of reality about the book might be forgiven if the whole plan of the story were not so much below, not only the author's usual scale of achievement, but the level generally reached by the novels of the day. The vulgarity of the book is probably the more offensive because it is not even up-to-. date vulgarity. The story cannot but remind its readers of the sentimental fiction of about twenty years ago.
Previous page
