The star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1908-1909, 1908-02-17

| Above the novels OF his confempora-
ries it towers head and shoulders.
Mr.. De Morgan is an Englishman
who began novel writing late In life,
like Du Maurier. His very first work
revealed his powers at their fullest r
his astonishing literary skill, his in
sight into character and ability to re-
produceait sympathetieally, his fund of
rich, Dickensian humor, his CHEEKY,
healthy philosophy. Joseph Vance"
was the greatest novel that had been
produced in the twentieth century.
Written in a discursive, seemingly aim
less, but really orderly manner, with
abundance of delightful moralizing
Upon his action as he developed it, it
resembled closely the works of the old
English school of novelists of the mid
die nineteenth century. 1t was fol-
lowed closely and in similar vein by
"Alice-for-Short," a novel of equal
merit, introducing the most charmingly
human and likable group of people
imaginable.
And now comes Somehow Good .
less than a year and a half after the
appearance of his first volume. To al
lay the possible anxiety of his admirers
that the author is becoming over-pro-
ductiye, his publishers state that be-
fore : sent forth his first book he had
had several others carefully sketched
out, besides several already written.
So far as the book itself is concerned,
they need have had no fears. 1t con-
tains no evidence whatever of careless
or hasty o~r.shoddy workmanship. We
cannot agree with the opinion that it is
an advance on anything of his yet pub
lished, yet submit that it is a book of
great importance and of fine flavor for
all of that.
There arel clear sanity and sweet
kindness in all that Mr.. De Morgan
writes. He has the faculty of trans
porting his readers to the scenes he
describes and making them in spirit
actual participants in the joys and sor-
of his characters. He, has a liking
for the metaphysical, too. He intro
duced us to the threshold of spiritland
in "Alice-for-Short," and here in
Somehow Good" he utilizes a fascinat-
ing theme involving the deepest mys-
teries of the human brain.
1t is the theme hat Gilbert Parker
employed in 1.-THE Right of Way" and
that has peer made use of by other
novelists as we'll. 1t is that of suspen-
sion of and loss of identity
consequent upon a sudden great shock
to the brain. The hero, Fenwick, in
his youth had married in India a
woman who, he subsequently discoy-
cred. had been wronged by a miscreant
who had worked his way into her con-
fidence when she was alone and unpro-
tected. In quick anger and misunder-
standing, Fenwick left his wife, who
soon after gave birth to the other
mans daughter. and wandered the
world over, becoming eventually an
American millionaire. Many years aft
err his marriage he returns to London
and, while reaching in a crevice of a
car for a fallen coin, is very
nearly electrocuted. The shock blots
out his memory of the past, from which
there come to him for months there
after only faint and painful glimmer-
ings.
This is his condition when his wife's
daughter finds him and takes him to
her home. There, of course. he meets
again his wife, and. all u~nknowing.
wooes and weds her once again,
Though telling him her distressful HIS
tory, the evil out of which, somehow,
good is to come, his wife conceals
Fenwick's own identity, mainly for the
sake of her daughter, who has grown
Into a lovable girl, with no trace of
her s%coundrelly father in her MAKEUP