NEW NOVELS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18879, 29 November 1924, Page 4 (Supplement)

NEW NOVELS.

"Chaperon to Cupid"—(T Fisher Unwin), by John Oxenhara.—Writers like the Williamsons familiarised their readers with a new type of novel, half guidebook, half motor advertisement, the different materials being cemented with the plaster of'romance.

In " Chaperon to Cupid " we have the same kind of thing minus the motors. A dazzlingly handsome and virtuous young man—need wo say- ho comes from New Zealand ?—meets, while crossing the Channel, an equally perfect specimen of mingled French and English womanhood, and the ensuing romance has for its background the beautiful Breton Coast. In these days of doubtful fiction, parents may be glad to know of a book like this,- which they could put with entire confidence' into the hand 3 of youthful daughters. Indeed, if the critic ,werrt limited to a single adjective per novel his choice for Mr. Oxenham's latest would certainly be " innocuous."

"The Tired Angel'»—(Stockwell), by E. M. Story.—"lt's mercy you want, not.jnstice," said the weary photographer to the disappointed client -who complained that her likeness did not do her justice. Similar treatment must be accorded to the writer of this naive, ingenuous and old-fashioned tale. The scene is iftid in New Zealand, but like Mr. Salteena's lack of gentility "you would hardly fiotice it," so strangely uncharacteristic of.-the Dominion is the- life depicted. It reads like a- first attempt at fiction by someone either very young or very old. and in either case there is little to be gained by more detailed criticism.

"Eoblnetta"—(Selwyn and Blount), by Beatrice Sheepshanks.—A pleasantly written love story of a type more common twenty 'years ago than in the present hard and sophisticated era. It tells of the love of a distinguishes. Indian official, married tp an uncongenial wife, ■/or an innocent and inexperienced girl of eighteen; The solution of the tangle is provided, for her, by a stray (and ■convenient) bullet, and for him by another favourite devico of the older novelist. The book, however, is much fresher and less hackneved than a bald outline, of the plot would suggest.