What London Is Reading

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 17, 21 January 1939, Page 10 (Supplement)

What London Is Reading

LONDON, November 25. 'THERE is a widely-spread fic--1 tion that only women who are concerned with commerce or industry can be properly described as women who work; that the care of looking after the home which has gone on for many thousands of years is not to be considered as work at all. Whatever the truth of this may be, "women are finding themselves more and more in the commercial world. A small batch of novels recently published deal with this problem.

By - - Charles Pilgrim

Ii.U.X.C." (Constable), by Frances Gray, is the story of a woman who finds herself in business almost in spite of herself. The initials of the title stand for British and United National Chemicals. J.his firm is run by a woman, who accidentally sells the secret of a poison gas to the Government of another country, and then ha.s to sell its antidote to her own. Her business dealings include a great patriotic campaign in which one of the firm's typists plays an important part by being chosen as "England's Venus." The typist becomes a film star and marries an earl, who buys B.U.N.C. This tale of modern commerce, and politics is not devoid of the - clement of fantasy and has plenty of satire. There is also any amount of "incident and plot, including even murder and a sensational trial scene. "8.U.N.C." is a first novel and a very promising one, for it shows an author with a fertile mind allied to an alert literary gift. The Humble Hero Mr. Warwick Deeping is another of the experienced story tellers. In "The Malice of Men" (Casscll) he has "told the story of John Lancaster, the son of a small grocer. After his father's death by suicide, John enjoys better fortune through the success of his mother in the seaside town of Sandbourn. When his mother dies, he find himself in possession of four thousand pounds and starts a career as a business man "with artistic proclivities. In time John meets tlTc heroine, Sanchia Cherrill, considerably his social superior and destined to become the wife of Sir Beverley Bullstrode. Sir Beverley may be ranked amongst the bad baronets. He ill-treats his wife and in the past lias inflicted an intolerable indignity on John Lancaster. Therefore, the two are enemies on more than one count. Mr. Deeping is too experienced at writing novels for popular success not to provide the kind of ending Ills readers will enjoy. "The Malicc of Men" should be, and doubtless will be, amongst the best sellers of the publishing season, and the author's large army of admirers will find once again their favourite lias not let them down. Lawrence to His Friends It is probable that the many-sided enigmatic character of Lawrence of Arabia will never be fully plumbed; that those who knew him and those who did not will be alike puzzled to resolve his many contradictions. A new volume nmy add to the clarification of the mystery. "The Letters of T. E. Lawrence," edited by David Garnett (Cape) is a great and fascinating book of nearly 900. pages. The letters show the variety and multitude of Lawrence's friends; they show too that he may be accounted amongst the great letter-writers. 0::o sees 'tlie 'writcr-iii-all

manner of moods, approaching life heroically, impishly, or in a spirit which cannot but be described us "cus.sedlv." But whatever the mood, the unflagging vitality is never absent. Mr. Garnett has done his editing with the greatest help to the reader. Journalism and the Home Hiss Eileen Winncroft lias written a tale of another kind of working woman in "Be a Gent, Little Woman, Be a (•out (John Lane). The little woman of story is a free-lance journalist, who is compelled to maintain two children and a lazy luisbnnd. There is thus nn entertaining admixture of Fleet Street and domestic troubles. AVe <*et a fairly clear idea of the compromises and shifts to which the free lance is driven in making two ends meet; of the economies and anxieties in order to find a holiday for the children and the eternal problem of the husband who won't work but can still fascinate. The writer knows her "Street of Adventure," 'where the newspapers come from, ami the set of industrious, scnii-Bolicmian people who toil to turn out the necessary columns day. by day. "Sister Sanity" (Michael Josephs), 1)V Elliot Gray, is another novel written by a woman about women and newspapers. The heroine conducts and an answers to correspondents column under the pseudonym of "Sister Sanity." She has her own troubles, which she cannot solve, a husband she has not seen for five years, and another man who loves her devotedly. In her column she lias been giving highly moral advice to a multitude of anxious readers, but cannot apply effectually her advice to liorself. An operation befalls "Sister Sanity," and as a result she loses lier own identity and becomes the woman who has given so muclr didactic and moral comfort to her correspondents. She must adopt her own moral code and return to her husband, with results not altogether liappy. Here again we have a moving picture of the newspaper office and its staff. Jiiss Gray uses a satiric pen, but kindliness is her main attitude.