READABLE NOVELS.—Land of My Fathers. By R. D. Hemingway. (Andrew
Melrose. 7s.)—An exciting little story, part of which passes in North Wales and part in Australia. The local colour in both cases seems unusually good.—The Dippers. By Ben Travers. (Bodley Head. 7s. 6d.)—This story seems to possess distinct possibilities for a cinema play. In this form it would probably be exceedingly funny, but as a novel it is distinctly confusing.—The Queen of Atlantis. By Pierre Benoit. (Hutchinson. 8s. 6d.)—This book was crowned by the French Academy last year as the best novel of the season, but it loses considerably in translation, whereby its faults are magnified and its likeness to the works of Sir Rider Haggard considerably increased. Nevertheless, it is an absorbing story.—Dead Man's Pack and Old Thorne. By W. H. Hudson. (J. M. Dent. 7s. 6d.)—The first part of this book is an attempt to whitewash the much-blackened character of the Saxon Queen Elfrida. The author's extraordinary consciousness of locality vivifies what might otherwise be a dull story. An Old Thorne is a short story of local superstition, powerfully written. Mr. Hudson's books are always events. In this his latest he shows a resemblance to Thomas Hardy—he is perhaps the only living writer of whom this can be said. A Horrible Suspicion. By Andreas Eje. (Bale, Sons, and Danielsson. 6s.)—A translation from the Swedish, this story is a complicated study of hereditary insanity and the power of suggestion. It is improbable but highly dramatic.—The Vacation of the Selwyn. By William Dean Howells. (Harper. 7s.)—A posthumous work giving an account of the Shaker community, a delightful New England group, and brings out the charm of their simplicity. The account of the sisters learning how to make good coffee is particularly delightful. The story is slight, a mere sketch of the discomforts endured by a professor and his wife in their summer lodgings, but it is written with the author's usual charm, and is everywhere permeated by the spirit of Shakerism.
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