The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-10-17

happens that year before I had read | the manuscript of Mir Curwoods S other 1 great novel, The Rivers End and at | that time I said: This is the best Cur wood novel yet. There never was another like it. There probably never will be an other with such magic, with such an in | spired combination of love and adventure, l realization and enchantment. The great reading public evidently | thought the same thing, for the magazine | jumped up by tens of thousands, mopln after month, and when The River Eno was published in book form it became a best seller at once, and for seven or eight months was among the first three l m the best selling list.
 Then came the manuscript of The Valley of Silent Men,.
 And l hardly knew what to say-i had said it all about the first novel. So l just lay down and said, A story as good as The Rivers End is some story cut here it is Readers seemed to think I meant only as good, and have Jumped all over me. Oh, well, that's what an editor expects.
 t'How that man Curwood can write! | He knows the far north as perhaps no other writer does, and he makes you want to know it He couldn't do that | if he did not actually live his stores before he writes them. He has seen the wonderland he paints for us, ne mas met the men and women who live under his pen. He has come close into the hearts and understanding of men and women and little children of what he calls 'Go4 Country That is why in The Valley or Silent Men you will find Jim Kent So real, and why Marette, the mystery girl, will be a beautiful feature of flesh and blood.
 DO you want a hint of the story? tba hoe rraaf t~cp in the Royal Mounted, tells story that brands him as murderer and sets an- other man free. But the doctors diag- nosis was wrong; death by hanging grins in the troopers face. Love of life and of beautiful mystery girl who had laughed at him and called him liar now makes him a fugitive-a hunter be- come the hunted
 With him. down those fabled rivers flowing north to the frozen Arctic speeds the girl, whose own secret winds hSd a thread of wild magic to the hidden Valley of Silent Men,
 I'm not going to tell you any mora of the story, but if you know Curwood at all you can we'll imagine the tremen- dous epic of the Canadian northwest, ths lost outpost of civilization which he de- velops from this dramatic situation.
 EXIT BETTY"
 By Grace Livingston Hill lMrs Lutzl
 Frontisplece in Colors, J, B. Lippincot
 Company, Publishers, Philadelphia.
 This pretty romance Is pleasing combina ton of character development, thrilling adventure, tears and sunshine, with a clear and attractive religious note The vivid pictures of the diff ferent characters and their pehavlor under the given circumstances make
 al tnferAstinR story aD sorbing the readers attention through one unexDected event after another.
 Elizabeth Stanhope is truly poor littlerich girl" with a designing step mother, a fortune to be hers when she reaches majority in three months. and Il sweet and trusting disposition. She is introduced to us in her deepest trouble. A timid girl at the bridal altar, she looks into the face of the man be- side her. and he is not the one she ex- pected to marry. Saved by timely swoon, she Is left in the restroom to recover and while the guests are gos- sipiug in the church and waiting Tor her return, she eludes the doctor and slips out a side door into the stormy night She must get away-she knows not where--anywhere to escape
 Providentially, Jane Carson is pass ing. Jane is wonderful-one cannot do her justice in few sentences. Indeed. the heart of sold which developments prove she possesses. and her capable management of Betty's affairs picture her so attractively she becomes close rival as heroine of the story
 THE GLOSS OF YOUTH"
 Ry Horace Howard Furness, Jr. J. b.
 I.ippincott Company, Publishers, Phi!a-
 delphia.
 This Is delightful one-act play deal ing with an imaginary incident in the lives of Shakespeare and John Fletcher in which also appear the youthful John Milton and Oliver Cromwell. In it's nlaN is dediClted to