COMEDY AND TRAGEDY

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 120, 16 November 1929, Page 21

COMEDY AND TRAGEDY

VARIETY IN FICTION

"Lucky ..Star," by Owen Rutter (London: Hutchinson) is frankly extravaganza. It tells of how the dark star, travelling through space at 200 miles a second, struck England and cut off the little village of Upper Shrimpton, leaving it stranded in the sea, un-meas-ured watery • miles "from anywhere. That is Mr. Rutter's ingenious idea. When the villagers realise that they are marooned, ' cut \,a, they form a Government, and plunge more deeply than ever before into politics, with entertaining results—for the reader. Mr. Rutter is revealed in "Lucky Star" as a clever satirist with a rich gift of humour. He knows also to tho weight of & hair how much.of the loveinterest a novel of this kind must carry,, and his promise at the outset of keeping his readers' amused from start to finish is generously^ performed. Honeymoon in Switzerland. "He and Ski," by Dawson Gfatfix (London: Herbert Jenkins) is a delieiously funny- tale, of a honeymoon fiasco. ./Mr. Gratrix is a light-hearted and care-free writer. In this tale of winter sports'in Switzerland, vrhither Bob and Bunny are journeying on their wedding tour, ho is very amusing. Paris is reached, and Switzerland seems far off when Bob discovers that his passport has been mislaid. Bunny goes on alone to their destination, and it is indeed some time again before she sees her.spouso of a few hours. In Paris Bob meets with Gertie, a Gaiety girl with designs on tho youthful husband, and she also is bound for St. Chaux. Tho pair^travel together—at least Gertie arranges it so—and Bob is frantic when ho finds • Bunny missing. Howover, with the aid of a friend, the complications ace unravelled. Gertie is happily sorted out, : explanations are satisfactory, the honeymoon' proceeds in a setting^ of sun and snow. ■ '• Thames-side Mystery. "Jack o' Lantern," by George- Goodchild (London: Hodder and Stoughton) is an ingenious thriller. Mist, dripping lumber, and a lonely night-watchman see murder, done on the Thames waterfront.' But there was surely never a stranger explanation of a string of incomprehensible crimes of a sanguinary, nature than is given in this clever mystery story. Two judges, ono of the highest Courts in Britain, and another equally renowned in Berlin, play chess o_' nights.while the,murderer adds victim to victim, and.'while Sonia, the beautiful daughter 'of the British judge who sentenced- one rogue, after another to tho gallows, is drawn, into strange and, nerve-wracking experiences; moreover, her ' lovor 's, a rising detective, of 'Scotland Yard, is threatened with dismissal because he cannot solve the problems. London,, in all its mysterous cosmopolitanism, the ..night life of East and West, are. portrayed in startling realism. Lefroy, a : madman, with musical geniua and a perverted brilliance in. every other direction, Kate, the really fine., girl who becomes his dupe, and a host of minor characters are brought to lifp before the author springs his wonderful surprise. A sleek, apparently innocuous-. Indian servant adds to the suspense, but ,the criminal is most ingeniously hidden until the final chapter. Thrills, a flowing literary, style, and a merciless mirror of human passions are the feature of this thrilling novel. Heridity Under Test. '■■'■■■ "Fruits of -Deception,", by A. -A. Einm'ctt (London :".:Hu'r&t arid Blackett, Ltd.), is a clever novel in which the proposed interchange of children to yirovo the soundness of certain opinions on. heridity goes amiss, with extraordins.ry results.' Hereward Ancestre, banker,'.born with a silver spoon in his mouth, is under the delusion "that, his son has been . handed over to poor people and that ho is bringing up their child as his own, intending to establish the identity of his,own son at the right time.: The boys themselves grow up in ignorance of -their .identity, with amusing complications, but all turns. out well iii the end for, 'both of them and for the. reader's entertainment. . .