The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1933-06-30


BY WALTER ID. HICKMAN
CTYLES in stories of northwest
~ Canada as we'll as Alaska have
changed greatly in the past twenty
years. Years ago we moved slowly
on a dog train over the great Snow
covered country.
In those days our hero suffered
hunger and cold and often he was
left helpless to die in the far north
until the author thought of some
way to rescue him.
Now days all that has changed.
The author of the distant north
stories has the airplane as we'll as
the wireless to get his hero out of
trouble and the villain closer to
death.
That was my thought as turned
the pages of Forbidden Valley" by
William Byron Mowery also author
of Heart of the North and THE
Silver Hawk"
Now days, the author does not
have to let his tracker of bad men
plough through the snow on foot.
He allows him to soar over the val
legs and the mountains, permitting
our hero to get a birdseye view Of
the hiding-out place Of the bad
man and his gang.
Forbidden Valley" is a good ex-
ample of how style has changed IN
stories of the northwest mounted
police and the far north. Authors
of even stories of the far north
must keep track with progress.
But the style in the basic quail
tiles of our heroes as we'll as our
villains have not changed. They
are just using new tools and think
ing new thoughts.
Take Curt Tennyson in Forbid
den Valley" for example. When
you meet him he has returned to
Edmonton with his pal, Smash
Desplaines, from an air trip to the
Arctic region.
Curt has been out of the service
of the northwest mounted for a
number of years and he is ready
to take a job prospecting northern
Canada by air for large company.
Being a former mounted police in
Canada must be great deal like
being an ex-actor or former news
paperman. You just can't get it out
of your blood.
And so. Curt accepts from Supt.
Marlin of the mounted police a
commission to track down a motor
ious and dangerous international
crook by the name of Karakahan.
OF course he is a Russian.
You probably will want to know
that Curt is supposed" to be en-
gagged to Martins daughter, Rosa
lie, a selfish girl who was just hold
ing Curt to her apron strings Il
mean evening gown because the
book does not indicate that Rosalie
could boil water without burning IT'D
until she found rich man.
Then for 900 some more pages,
you soar with Curt to the far north,
where the master crook is living in
Forbidden Valley, Safeguarded by
savage northern tribe, the high
mountains, the turbulent rivers and
other things. Our villain has his
own airplane and he knows how to
use poison as we'll as cunning.
You are going to be interested in
Sonya, the mystery girl of the story
and her brother" Paul, who make
strange journey on foot and boat
to Forbidden Valley. but the air.
planes are always in hiding some
place along the trail.
Mowery knows his north and the
people as they live today as we'll as
their traditions. He knows how to
inject the theater of melodrama,
action and suspense in writing. He
is an artist at that
His characters are life-like and
they could do all the good and bad
things he records.
Here is most pleasant hot weather
reading I knew that it made me
forget the heat. and that is some
thing.
Forbidden Valley" is published by
Ray Long and Richard r. Smith,
Inc, New York city. Sells for 81.
y =
Am getting some interesting
answers to my question-How many
times have you read Alice In Won
derland?" DID,. H. Dale of pit North
Illinois street, suggests that it isn't
so much a question of how many
times one has read it from cover to
cover, but how often one has read
at it."
believe that is true. A good deal
like Walt Whitman's Leaves of
Grass" is to me. l am daily read
ing at it."
Dale writes-"I still have my first
Alice A shabby inexpensive Nicely
edition. A mass geographically, still,
being Alice l like it. The most
beautiful edition I have seen is by
the Black Sun Press of Paris. Small
folio. white vellum unbound sheets.
hand eolored illustrations. 1t was
lovely. The Modern Library. I find
most desirable reading copy"
This letter is splendid. Let's have
some more.