Literature NEW WORKS OF FICTION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25458, 12 February 1944, Page 2

Literature

NEW WORKS OF FICTION

Keep the Home Guard Turning. By Compton Mackenzie (Chatto and Windus), 10s 6d. Biggies “Fails to Return.” Bv W. E. Johns (Hodder and Stoughton), 7s. They Were Sisters. By Dorothy Whipple (Murray), 10s 6d. ' An Eye for a Tooth. By Dornford Yates (Ward, Lock), 9s 6d.

By Compton Mackenzie Mr Mackenzie’s island home is Barra, in the Outer Hebrides, so he is no doubt an authority on Great Todday and Little Todday, of the same group, which are no more or less figments of his imagination than the Home Guard personnel of this goodnatured book. It should perhaps be mentipned that Mr Mackenzie, as his dedication reveals, has also had experience as a company commander of the Home Guard in these Scottish fastnesses. The problems of himself and his men were often “smved by laughter,” and so it is not improper that he should submit the worries of the Todday organisation to the same treatment. These are of the sort which were as typical of Home Guard days in New Zealand—with uniform deficiencies, an unfeeling civilian population, dissensions between districts, and so on, as their basis. The case of the doctor who objected to tank traps on the main road, and the battle between Ben Nevis and Todday forces for Todaidh Beab, are the stuff of a story that nearly all Home Guardsmen who have not taken themselves too seriously will enjoy.

Squadron Leader at Large Complete with an end-paper map and several rather murky illustrations, one in colour, Biggies “Fails to Return” relates the further adventures of one Bigglesworth, a squadron leader in the R.A.F. He is sent to Monaco by Intelligence to pick up a certain “Princess X,” an Italian with an antiFascist background, who is escaping from the Axis authorities. When “ Biggies ” is not heard from his friends in the force go in search of him, to achieve in his company a lastminute dash from the enemy m a stolen Savoia. It is all quite entertaining, but rather juvenile. Three Sisters

The three daughters of a prdvuvcial business man, Lucy, Vera, and Charlotte, are the subjects of Dorothy Whipple’s They Were Sisters, m which they sit for full-length portraits covering their vicissitudes over a quarter century between wars. The study of Lucy who, as the eldest of the Field girls,' remains a beacon in the distress which her sisters bring upon themselves and their children is a solid achievement. This is a Book Society choice.

A Chandos Adventure In his new adventure story, as related by the inimitable, and indestructible Richard William Chandos, Dornford Yates deals with events of 10 years ago, when three Englishmen, travelling near Salzburg, came upon a murder and a mystery involving a titled Austrian family. As in all his books, Mr Yates maintains a pleasant pace, while his heroic characters, including the feminine ones, are nearly all handsome in face and nature, and the villains are, to say the .least, ingenious and thorough in their villainfes.—V. V. L.