Books and AuthorsLILLIAN KENDRICK BYRN
Books and AuthorsLILLIAN KENDRICK BYRN
LILLIAN KENDRICK BYRN
The thousands of admirers of “Don Q,” the crafty bandit, elusive and fearless, with claws under velvet that tear with merciless fury when roused to action, will be delighted with these new chronicles of further thrilling adventures of that mysterious character. The joint authorship of the “Don Q” stories is the rather unusual combination of mother and son, who, having traveled extensively in Spain and Spanish America, are able to put the local color into their stories with sure hands. It would, perhaps, be saying too much to declare that the portrait of the bandit is drawn from acquaintance with the original character, but no one can doubt that the authors have met with many adventures and heard many stories at first hand which have suggested the polished outlaw.
This story presents Saul during the time of his persecution of the Nazarenes and the death of St. Stephen of Galilee, before he became St. Paul of the Christian Church. The period immediately succeeding the crucifixion is the most stirringly interesting of any in the world’s history. Never before or since has there been such a wave of deep feeling, of psychological uplift and high thought, mingled with the warring of the fiercest passions and the basest corruption. Miss Miller has given us, as in “The Yoke,” a skillful weaving of heart-stirring incidents and a love story of the purest and noblest type.
A delight to the beauty-loving soul is this little book for the amusement of the children, bound in heavy gray boards, with quaint, corded back and heavy hand-pressed paper. The drawings and marginal decorations are in true Childe Harold style, which is a guarantee of their worth.
Mrs. Wadsworth has elaborated and improved an old nursery classic. The first eight topics are in their original form, but she has added four others in the same style, and Mabel Wood Hill has set them to appropriate music. Each full page is prefaced by another verse on the same subject, but in different meter, and the whole is beautifully bound in brown boards, with line decorations of birds and beasts in colors, the drawings being the handiwork of Marguerite Wood and Harold Sichel.
A big factory for art stained glass is not a likely place to look for romance, but Mr. George has laid in such a scene a story of fascinating interest. The action covers also the great West and mining, timber cutting and the practice of law in those regions. The central theme of the story, however, is a study of municipal government under existing methods of election andmaintenance. Conspiracies, lobbying, bribery, blackmailing and other concomitants of present-day government politics are laid bare in a convincing manner, while the love story keeps and holds the reader’s interest in these questions.
The discovery of a fourth dimension is surely a very interesting thing and no one can give a more thrilling account of the consequences of such a discovery than the gifted Zona Gale, whose Pelleas and Ettarre stories are so widely known and loved. The adventure, the mystery and swift rush of events are so thrilling in this island of Miss Gale’s discovery that the reader loses himself in the absorbing account, and it is only when the book is laid down with a sigh when finished that he realizes that he has been filching time from his usual rest or occupation for a sojourn in the regions of enchantment.
This is a thoroughly excellent and descriptive account of the many lovely nooks and corners that dot the great valley of the “Father of Waters.” It is also a study of the types of the inhabitants of the section and contains much interesting and valuable historical matter. The illustrations are from the author’s own camera and add greatly to the interest of the chronicle.
In the ’squire’s house, in a New England house, there has been a tragedy in the night. Later a piratical seafarer appears and the village becomes the scene of strange adventures. The mysterious bringing of a little girl to the squire’s house, her subsequent bringing up and the winning of the old man’s reluctant affections, her love affair, complicated with the reappearance of the sailor, whose power over the ’squire only adds to the mystery, and the final adjustment of all the puzzling questions, bringing happiness and justice to all, makes a readable story.
A rare value attaches to this book from the fact that it is not only a succinct account of the actors who have made a name on the American stage and transmitted to their children their talent, but also reproduces a number of interesting old portraits, which are of the greatest value to the student of the beginnings of the American stage. The histories of such well-known families as the Jeffersons, the Drews and Barrymores, the Booths and other favorites will find readers everywhere. The whole matter is well treated and beautifully illustrated.
The titles of Mr. Eggleston’s previous books, “A Carolina Cavalier,” “Evelyn Byrd,” “A Daughter of the South,” etc., show the chosen field of his work to be the painting of Southern romances. In “Blind Alleys,” however, he has selected an entirely different field and has given us a significant and typical study of social conditions in New York. There is a sweet and wholesome love story, of course. Indeed, there are two of them, and altogether the novel is one of exceptional interest.