LATEST FICTION

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 143, 20 June 1925, Page 17

LATEST FICTION

"Sehvood, of Sleepy, Cat." By Frank K. Spearman. London: Hodder and bioughton, Ltd. "Tho -Reverend Captain Kettle." T. v Utcliffo Hvne. London: G. (/ iiarrap sad Co., Ltd. ■'•Tho^-Howße of Finny." By Henry J. Ihornpson. London: Herbert Jenkins. .: "The Wedding Song," By Ethel Watts Mumiord. London: Hodder and 'Stoughton.

Sehvood is a "man's man" in the fictioi.ul sense a hard worker in the back country ot Aorth America, but he could iiui, resist the charms of a pretty girl li o met on the Whern'trail where ho was te:.mster. He has a tough problem to clean up. Sleepy Cat of its nesta of gamblers and. bad men, for, as one of the diameters in this virile novel describes it JF there s any human scum in the whole blamed Lnitcd States that ain't landed in Sleepy Cat it must he because they am t. heard of it yet." There is humour and pathos, villainy and rou"ii 2u(id-hearted.nesa, and a fresh ness of outln'A- and treatment in "Sclvrood of Sleepy Cat'- that make delightful as well as s;iciliiig reading.,, Tha. rugged t kiadJv Dog.

tor Carpy; tho shrewd cautious M'Alpin; "smooth" Dave Tracy; the rascally Starbuck and his gang of gamblers; the tragic romance of Starbuck and Mag Hyde; the happier but chequered love affair of Selwood and the charming frankly innocent Christie Fyler—these are woven into a stirring and many-col-oured tale that is alive with incident.

In the latest addition to the "Captain Kettle" series Mr. Hyno brings the hardened little sailor out a Particular Methodist, even more than usual,' and the love element is introduced for the first time. Although Captain Kettle has some exciting amorous adventures, he manages to remain quite true to Mrs. Kettle, and to continue to look forward to the time when he will be able to form his own little band of Wharfedale Particular Methodists. In the chilly North, amongst the whalers, and coal mining, and in several other rough places on the globe, Kettle has many adventures out of which he cornea right side up as usual. The novel is entertaining and quite up to the Kettle books' standard.

Comedy is the predominant feature in "The House of Finny.", It is a lively story of modern business built up by judiciously liberal advertisement, of the value of which Bobert Finny, proprietor, has a particularly keen" sense. But changing times call for the application of,, methods to suit those times, and Fiuny's idea is first to infuse a little new blood into the veins of his great department store. This is to be done by marrying. his daughter to his manager. The girl does not see it in quite the same light. There are difficulties in his way. In desperation Finny's nephew, a bright'young "modern" among artists, is called, in and given a partnership. The nephew accepts, with unusual and disastrous results to'the business; but in the end.all is straightened out, and Finny is vindicated in his ideas of how modern business should bo carried on.

Ethel Watts Mumford has the faculty for showing how rough the course of true love.can be. and how even.so a placid heaven may,be reached at the.endof the. passage. In "The Wedding Song," her latest novel, she uses much local colour > derived • from the Pacific Islands, and this she uses v/ith skill in decorating her romance. Hayes Hallam, the "Pearl King," is lord o< the happy isles in the South Seas. Outside:his is-land-paradise.he knows nothing of .the world. In New York he falls into the clutches of Paul Glynn, a disreputable gambler, and in love with Beatrice, the gambler's sister. • She flees to the South Seas with' Hallam, pursued by the enranged Glynn,' who is determined to use her as his tool in a pearl robbery: from her husband's island. But Hallam's subjects, with the magic of their gods, defeat the gambler, and Esther Lane, the coarse-fibred but big-hearted queen of the Coral Islands, has her triumph when the lovers at last hear the crooning of the native wedding Eong on . their Paradise Island. . This' is a story with very special literary distinction.