THE BOOKSHELF

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21580, 26 August 1933, Page 9 (Supplement)

THE BOOKSHELF

p! BOOK SOCIETY. CHOICE | ENTERTAINING NOVEL All who have belonged to large families will devour Miss E.. Arnot Robertson's " Ordinary Families." It is B o good that one is impatient to share it and hear what everyone thinks of it. •This writer's every book comes as a delightful surprise. One of th<!i youngthe really striking novelists, sho jjfo written three, books, all astonishHingly good. In this latest story of Cfamily life, which surely sounds ordinary enough, sho obviously draws from her own experiences, Rnd such a vivid and heartening affair sho makes o&it that ono imagines that ovory .incident is true, which of course is highly ijn probable. The book details the story of a most

exciting family seen through the eyes <jf Lallie, the second daughter of tho house. Of course the family play into the writer's hands. She has a witty sense of character and shows her readers something new in fathers. Ho is an 'engineer who reconditions and sells yachts. So tho whole family are yacht-minded. They "do father proud"; take to tho water like gulls, dismiss a ducking; with a shake of the head and

glory in a stormy sailing. Father is the .family god. He has had a rich and thrilling life and his children are properly appreciative. A regatta and a birthday treat "in the

form olf a sea trip for the whole family and friends in two of the boats, giVo scope: for' Miss Robertson's fine sense of narrative. There is also Lallie's growing lip, which is as exciting a business as the yaohting. This is the kind of early life that Miss Robertson herlelf enjoyed. Lallie, one feels, is the kind of little girl she might easily have * been. She is most convincingly drawn; her freshness and sense of beauty are most satisfying. There are lovely things S in this book, but they were not an ordinary family, not they! Seen from the inside they will make an irresistibia apjjeal tc all readers. ." Ordinary Families," by B. Arnot Robertson. (Cape.) 1 •V* AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP A COOK 'AN INDEPENDENT DOMESTIC •v m. . . ii£ Titles are ever misleading. > The "Memoirs of Martha: The Autobiography of a Cook " sounds illuminating enough. Here it is, thinks the reader; here is what the cook really thinks of life above stairs sandwiched in between her meditations over the fryingpan. One presumes that she is , a good cook, an artist perhaps of the first rank, ana .naturally the mind is prepared for revelations. After all, she has plenty of scope, l'or cooks have hitherto been more or less reticent concerning their private lives* Well, the reader who draws these deductions from the subtitle will bo disappointed. Martha, a cook turned author, is not wholly given up to her cooking; she is much more important as a human being, and offers ier Readers a simple, straightforward account of her life as a domestic in England and Australia. She is a likeable body, independent, resourceful and plucky. Orphaned when very young, she emigrates to Australia and writes a telling account of ship-board conditions in the early days. Martha has nothing very startling to detail, but all her experiences carry the charm of her naive and independent nature. Now that she has grown old she seems to have caught the writing fever from'her present mistress, who has encouraged and assisted this new venture. The description of her one visit to Auckland will bewilder some

readers. The truth seemß that Martha remembered very little but the name. It is dangerous, to treat Aucklanders thus. ' ""Memoirs of Martha: Tho Autobiography of a Cook." (Arthur Barket, Limited.) K'' V ■ r MODERN LOVE STORY ' SWEDISH WRITER'S INSIGHT A most pleasing freshness as well as insight marks this story of the ■ -Swedish writer Dagmar Edquist. "The Marriage of Ebba Garland " has an air about it. This novelist reveals her heroine, Ebba, in such a telling manner that the reader gives her the most flattering attention. Every word she speaks is listened to, for Ebba is a real person and not merely a type. For tho novelreader there is little that is unusual in the outline of the story unless it is the Swedish background. Ebba is an independent working girl who is more than usually self-sufficient. Her sophis- ' ticated housemates consider " her -amorous technique to be hopelessly behind the times," but Ebba shrugs a shoulder. " Everyone," she says, " has a right to some extravagance, and hers is the belief that love might descend on her • like a fortune from an unknown uncle in Anlerica or the first prize in a lottery.Ebba does not worry; the / thought of beiiig an old maid does not upset her; she goes her way, enjoys her {ob, and in due course meets her fatd. t is not an easy fate, but it makes an interesting problem and good reading. The book is certainly above the average. Ebba is a de'lightful character. The , translation is ably done by Elizabeth Bprigge and Claude Napier. " The Marriage of Ebba Garland," by Pagnia Edquist v (Lovat Dickinson.) SCHOOLMASTER'S CHAINS BITTERNESS IN A BOOK Bitterness is very evident in Mr. Bernard Henderson's book of reminiscence, " Schoolmasters All, or Thirty Years' Hard." He loathed his work, his headmasters, the prison which bound him nil tho more securely because ho was good and obedient and satisfactory. In every other prison good conduct brings Early release; ; in the misplaced schoolmaster's prison it increases tho sentence. Mr. Henderson probably thinks H> be has escaped now. He hasn't. The hand of Cain is laid on him for all timo. At his most Rabelaisian he is still the Bsher, posturing for a class of admiring inferiors. His mind workß along stiff, icademic groqves all the timo. More- > »ver, like all of his kind, the man-of-the-world attitude sits uneasily on him —it is a cloak which never quite fits. The book is,illuminating rather than Rdmirablo. So many of tho master baitings, pupil corrections!, jokes and Storms-in-teacups which aro recorded keem too puerile to occupy an adult gind. Therein lies the book's value. Hero, without expurgation or editing, •J « 8 the mind of a type of ill-placed Jchoolmaster for all to note. Such a / k°°k may do pioro to correct the faults to the education system than dozens of fg M>ler treatises. ®§ Sohoolmaaten All, or Thirty Years' *<£r c ; r £» M by Bernard Henderson. (Con-