BOOKS IN LOCAL DEMAND.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 31, 6 February 1937, Page 2 (Supplement)

BOOKS IN LOCAL DEMAND.

I AUCKLAND LIBRARIES' LIST. The following list of hooks in demand .it the Auckland Public Libraries is supplied by the chief librarian: — NON-FICTION. The Olive Tree—Ry Aldous Huxley. The Dangerous Sea—Ry George Slocombe. Behind the Spanish Barricades—Ry - John L.in?rdon-Davies. Modern Debating—By E. R. Nichols and J. 11. Raccus. I Journey Without Maps — By Graham Greene. Saint Joan of Arc—Ry Virginia SaekvllleWest. Back to Malaya—ny Rruce Lockhart. FICTION. Inhale and Exhalo—Ry W. Saroyii.l. Gone With the Wind—Ry Margaret Mitchell. Roso Deeprose—By Sheila Kayc-Smlth. Timo Peace—ny Naomi Jacob. Threo Sheets in the Wind—By G. Gilpatrlc. Royal Flush—By Margaret Irwln. The African Witch—Ry Joyce Gary. Eyeless in Gaza—By Aldous II i-'l-v. San Folice—By Vincent Sbcrim.

IN RURAL ENGLAND. W. S. PERCY'S WANDERINGS. ' W. S. Percy, the well-known Australian pantomime comedian, has followed up his popular "Strolling Through Scotland" and "Strolling Through England" with another book on the English countryside. It is called "Strolling Through Cottage England," and is published by Collins. Jle begins with a little history, and reconstructs for us ••the earliest form of dwelling in Britain lit to bear the name of house," a. round hut built mi a small island surrounded by a swamp or lake. The second chapter is devoted to the evolution of the cottage both ill building and material, and wo see the part the differences in the. soil and in geology played in it. as well as how it reflects the'character of the people. We learn that it was ill the reign of Queen Elizabeth that the cottage "came into its own," we see how the advent of machinery and steam led to "the desertion of the villages for the towns that sprang up all over the Midlands and the Xorth with their ugly houses and mean, sordid streets, and how John Ruskin and William Morris helped to stem the tide and to divert the minds of men and women "into channels of beauty." The third chapter is devoted to inns, and we learn that in the history of the inn it stands second ill importance in the rilhige to the church, and that many of the old inns were connected with the old monasteries. The rest of the book is taken up with travels through the various counties, beginning with Kent. "Strolling Through Cottage England" is really a guide book in which the author not'only describes villages, towns, cottages and" inns, but discourses with the jovousness and abandon of an enthusiast on all kinds of kindred topics as diverse ae wattle and daub, Saxon architecture and Roman art, flowers and flower gardens, wind and water mills, building guilds, village crosses, and the connection between inns and music halls, all enlivened with personal reminiscences, stories, and anecdotes in which our own Xew Zealand figures time and again. It is altogether a book that is as pleasant to read as it is informing and it is made all the more delightful by numerous illustrations liom the. .authors orHnals in colour photogravure and line. '