RECENT FICTION.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 307, 28 December 1935, Page 2 (Supplement)

RECENT FICTION.

. Though the theme of the story runs along well-defined lines, "The Final Victory," by Hector Wintle (Duckworth), is noteworthy for its Eastern setting and its vivid picture of life in Malaya. It is the story of a young insurance clerk who is sent to join the staff of his firm in the East, being transported from an atmosphere of almost monotonous routine to one charged with adventure, passion, mental and spiritual trial and the clash of human emotions. The strain on his character is such as he had not contemplated and his strongest resolutions seem of no avail in the over, whelming atmosphere of abandon. The ideals which it was not difficult for him to uphold in England.are repeatedly submerged, but when the crucial test comes, in a dramatic climax, he shows the finest spirit of heroism and sacrifice.

Mr. Olaf Stapledon describes his new novel, "Odd Jolin" (Methuen), as "a storv between jest and earnest." It is atale of a super-normal man, and of his reactions to our civilisation and vice versa. John Wainwright, born in Enp;land of English parents, had Spanish, Moorish and Arab blood running remotely in his veins from his father's ancestry, as well as the mixed Scandinavian strains he inherited from his mother. John himself, very slow to develop as an infant, turned out an intellectual prodigy, and the story tells how he discovered other "super-normals" in various parts of the world and of the little South Sea Island community which they founded together. Altogether the theme is the kind which we have come to expect from Mr. Stapledon; but the treatment is a little disappointing. Some of John's childhood observations are interesting, however, and the communistic life of the little Pacific community is! very naturally and feelingly worked out. But while this may be a book that will serve to amuse an idle hour or two, it will hardly satisfy the critical reader who expects from Mr. Stapledon a story that leaves him with something to think about after perusal.