New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1897-05-30
CURRENT FICTION.
SOME MINOR STORIES. ROMANTIC. HYS-
Ti:RICAL AND OTHERWISE.


n WRITER OF FICTION BY Give Holland
I'mo' PIP. 49, Copeland Day X Co.
TltANSATLANTIC CHATELAINE: BY Helen
g. iioa'c ffinre 6rno. ~. 800 HouSAton. Mifilin
THE iD0L,MAKER- BY Adeline Sergeant l2mo.
PIP I0l- ID. Appleton & Co
fh Emo NOV nm Tkf r. By Graham Travers
THE CAREER or CANDIDA By George PASTOR
limo, PIP ~. >. Appleton :. 60.
ToM Si', GUEST. a Novel BY G y. Burgin
THE COMING or CHIOE. Rv Mrs Hungerford
(The Duchess), I4iao pp 5sc J. b Lp3:ncott
Company.
There are truly fashions in woodworking as
in boots. bonnets and equipaGes. and the tale
Ia Stevenson and Hope is stiu IN demand.
Miss Black follows, ard with real Il moderate
success, in the path ope-ed by Prince Otto"
and developed by The Prisoner Of Zenda-"
Spirited and ingenious is her recital OF the way
in which the daring Sirl-sovercgn Of a little
nd-duchy defeats The plans of her usurping
kinsman and brings to happy ending the idyl
or her love. Desiree is a charming specimen of
her Kind, and even more improbable incidents
than those selected 10y the novelist would be
condoned for the sake OF the well-drawn char
acter OF the young Grand duchess
Glamour" calls for sterner treatment from
the critic. 1t is Work written in Clasps dt is
rrofCse in capitals by a Lady who sways hys-
tcrioally in manner from Poe to Ouida from
, Hawthorne TO Marie Corelli. The experienced
reader may easily imagine its mixture of tense
Feeling gliding Ghosts, gorgeous Gems lofty
, Rhetoric, mussy Morals ana mystic Fatalities.
1t Is stale if not fat, and is Improbable to the
last degree.
a Writer OF Fiction" is a poignanty sad
story OF an English novelist who has survived
his vogue, and who finds himself descending to
ever lower depths of poverty. He has held his
work up TO ideal standards in the past but
tastes have changed and he that excursions
into the unsavory topics of life make The books
that SELL His own gather dust on the pub
fishers shelves, and everything points to grow
| ing degradation and suffering FOR his wife and
children. Driven to despair Icy his fears for
them and 10y his own privations he falls into
strange state OF disease ana semi-insanity. and
he begins TO work secretly upon book which
when finished is brilliant but defiling. Death
oVcrtakes him before he hear from the pub
Usher TO whom he sends his MSS. and his de-
voted wife, finding among his papers some rough
drafts OF its chapters recalls from the reluctant
/ publisher the work which promises to bring
prosperity 10 herself and her children but which
will also stain irremediably her husbands mem
. DRY. This, in brief. is the story, which is told
with dextcrous manipulation of episodes and
with realistic force. The reader who enjoys a
clever study OF the painful side OF life Will APP
preciate "A Writer OF Fiction; the more jul
dicious person who wishes merely 10 be enter
tanned would better avoid it
Mrs. Princes second novel has the interest
. which for American readers always attaches to
the story Of an international marriage. The ex-
periences Of the New England heroine with her
titled French husband detailed with n good
deal of feminine subtlety and viVaCty-it may
be added with much feminine sentimentality
AS is so often the case-in fction-the man is a
cur, and has won his heiress partly through
fraud. The author oblGes to admire the skill
with which she indicates those irreconcilable
and tyrannous differences in temperament be
lief and conduct which the differences in race
inheritance and training involve for husband
and wife; otherwise she deals with the situation
in the conventional method Of the period. She
also follows the modern fashion of unhappy
conclusions which is pity. for a woman's
novel is rarely strong enough in plot TO sustain
dramatically and successfully hopeless end
ing.
The dol-Maker' justifies no particular criti-
cal attention. though it is readable enough in its
way. The parsonage who gives a title TO the
story is a SNUG British tradesman and church
| men ber who manufactures under the rose vast
quantities Of Wiley suggestive heather gods for
! the idolaters OF remote regions. The character
| OF this money getting hypocrite is treated with
something Of originality and ironc force: Of the
! people who surround him it must be said that
/ they rather colorless The story moves
I ....If