Novel 338: Edward Dutton Cook, Leo (1863)

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A man engaged to be married is led into money troubles.

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For Cook, see Novels 040, 111, 166, and 262.

The characters are “dashed off with spirit and coloured to the life. . . . This method . . . has a charm of its own. . . . The reader will find this style of storytelling as well and as cleverly executed as can reasonably be desired.” Athenaeum, December 5, 1863.

“Throughout amusing, the story is good, and is well and dramatically told. . . . It paints human nature fairly.” Westminster Review, January, 1864

v.1 https://archive.org/details/leo00cookgoog

v.2 https://archive.org/details/leo02cookgoog

v.3 https://archive.org/details/leo01cookgoog

Novel 335: Lucy B. Walford, The Mischief of Monica (1891)

Sir William Quiller Orchardson, A Social Eddy (Left by the Tide)

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Two fashionable young sisters go to live with their merchant uncle outside Liverpool.

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For Walford, see Novels 018, 066, 121, 174, 227, and 279.

“Bright and pleasant reading,” with “abundant interest and movement.” Athenaeum, October 10, 1891

It is “certain to be enjoyed”; Walford “has a good deal of . . . persistent and interested wakefulness of sympathetic observation” which gives “a charm to the apparently charmless commonplaces of ordinary life.” Spectator, October 31, 1891

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https://archive.org/details/mischiefmonica01walfgoog

Novel 334: Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Strangers and Pilgrims (1873)

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In spite of herself, a beautiful but selfish young woman falls in love with her father's strong and virtuous curate.

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For Braddon, see Novels 004, 061, 115, 170, 222, 223. and 280.

“One of the saddest stories that we have read”; the characters are “thoroughly human, and, at the same time, thoroughly pitiful.” Athenaeum, July 26, 1873

“A painful story, and confused in its rendering of character,” but “there is a certain quality of intention in the characters of this book which carries the reader over the faults and dreary bits.” Saturday Review, August 23, 1873

For this fortnight’s novel, download

v.1 https://archive.org/details/strangerspilgrim01brad

v.2 https://archive.org/details/strangerspilgrim02brad

v.3 https://archive.org/details/strangerspilgrim03brad

Novel 333: Frances Milton Trollope, One Fault (1839)

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A woman suffers from her husband’s bad temper.

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For Trollope, see Novels 029, 079, 138, 189, 190, 191, and 269. The reviews of this one were not particularly favorable.

“Though it excites little interest and furnishes little entertainment, it is agreeably written, and contains a sufficient number of pleasing scenes and descriptions to render it very readable.” Spectator, November 30, 1839

“Mrs. Trollope no doubt draws forcibly, but there is a rigidity in her characters which removes them from ordinary life.” Literary Gazette, November 30, 1839

“A very inferior novel . . . dull and disagreeable; . . . nothing so preposterous as the one-faulted husband ever existed.” Morning Post, December 6, 1839

v.1 https://archive.org/details/onefaultnovel01trolrich

v.2 https://archive.org/details/onefaultnovel02trolrich

v.3 https://archive.org/details/onefaultnovel03trolrich

Novel 331: Frank Barrett, A Recoiling Vengeance (1888)

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An attorney attempts to guide a client’s estate to a proper recipient.

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Frank Barrett (1845-1926) wrote some 40 novels in a variety of subgenres between 1874 and 1914; this one has a particularly engaging narrator.

“A very pretty, natural, and refreshing story is A Recoiling Vengeance, although a slight and artless one. . . . in its clearness and brightness it reminds us a little of the manner of Anthony Trollope.” Saturday Review, September 8, 1888

Barrett has “a style which has ease and freedom, and at the same time a certain grace and restraint. . . . It is a bright, taking story, rendered all the more attractive by a vein of very pleasant humour which runs through it.” Spectator, September 29, 1888

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Novel 324: Annie E. Wickham, Loveday (1896)

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A Cornish farmer rescues from shipwreck a man of dubious antecedents, along with his daughter and niece.

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Annie E. Wickham published two novels, both in 1896.  Nothing else appears to be known about her.

The novel has “much originality” and “one of the most fascinating scoundrels who have ever appeared in fiction.” Spectator, April 4, 1896

It “has charm—charm of manner, of matter.  It is above all things fresh.” Athenaeum, April 4, 1896

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Novel 323: Sarah Doudney, When We Two Parted (1885)

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A selfish heiress resents a beautiful former friend; meanwhile, a puritanical girl falls in love with a worldly actor.

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Sarah Doudney (1841-1926) wrote poems and hymns as well as over fifty novels between 1871 and 1906, many of them pious works for girls.

“Shrewd sayings in a sententious form are scattered thickly throughout these pages, and prove the author to be a close but kindly student of humanity. She possesses, moreover, a vein of quiet humour which emerges pleasantly at times, as well as an artistic restraint which spares the reader unnecessary details. ‘When We Two Parted’ is a pleasant story of the conventional order.” Athenaeum, March 28, 1885

“The lazy life of a small country town, where it is ‘always afternoon,’ is described with ease, and, if events are rare, the reader hardly recognizes the want of them. . . . Miss Doudney writes in a pleasant style. . . The book has a liberality of thought and treatment not common to works of this class.” Saturday Review, April 11, 1885   

A (somewhat) contrasting view:

“The only fault to be found with When We Two Parted is that it is too much of a good thing.” Academy, March 21, 1885

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The only digitized copy of today’s novel that I have found was once accessible from the British Library. But in October 2023, the British Library was shut down as a result of a ransomware attack, and now, after 16 months, its Victorian novel collection remains inaccessible; many links on my site do not work in consequence. I hope someday the collection returns; meanwhile, I trust nobody will mind if I post some British Library pdfs to an online storage drive, and links to said drive on this website, like this one, to today’s novel:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-n6YVdUjZQHjNqRX9ZiSEvX2EpfEriXu/view?usp=share_link

Novel 321: Arabella Kenealy, Molly and Her Man of War (1893)

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Two cousins tour Italy on a yacht; one falls in love with an American sailor.

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Arabella Kenealy (1859-1938) wrote some 25 novels between 1893 and 1917, many with feminist implications.

“A spirit of audacious flippancy and rather determined light-heartedness informs the thing and keeps it moving.” Athenaeum, February 10, 1894

“Rollicking fun and humour enliven every page of Miss Kenealy’s book. . . .  Miss Kenealy is a daring satirist; sometimes she is a savage one. . . .  The story is an antidote for the ‘blues.’” Academy, March 3, 1894

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Novel 320: Adeline Sergeant, Seventy Times Seven (1888)

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On the eve of her marriage, a woman discovers her fiancé’s discreditable past.

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Adeline Sergeant (1851-1904) published some ninety novels during a twenty-one-year career, of which this was fifth.

“We have not read lately a more enjoyable novel of incident than Seventy times Seven. It is such a treat when an author has the wit to construct an effective plot and to work it out simply, without worrying the reader with immaterial side-issues and jejune reflections; and that is what Mrs. Sergeant has done.” Academy, June 2, 1888

The account of the two main characters “gradual approach to each other is told with a fine exquisiteness of imaginative realisation”; it “is from first to last a beautiful and satisfying story.” Spectator, August 25, 1888

A contrasting view:

“There is a half-heartedness about Miss Sergeant’s handling of the apparatus of sensationalism which borders dangerously on the ridiculous. . . .  Miss Sergeant is not yet at home in the novel of incident.” Athenaeum, May 5, 1888

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v.1 https://archive.org/details/seventytimesseve01serg

v.2 https://archive.org/details/seventytimesseve02serg

v.3 https://archive.org/details/seventytimesseve03serg

Novel 318: Lady Florence Bell, The Arbiter (1901)

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A man is forced to sacrifice either his career or his wife’s happiness.

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Lady Florence Bell (1851-1930) wrote only a few novels late in the Victorian period; this one features an interesting dilemma and vivid characters.

“In spite . . . of a flavour of improbability, the story is brightly written and full of that sort of incident which goes home to the English novel-reader. . . . The characters are all clearly drawn society people of a typical sort.” Manchester Guardian, November 13, 1901

“Mrs. Hugh Bell combines an original plot with a very clever study of some of those cross-relations and duties of family life to which she has given so much critical attention.  Her story has also the charm of the unexpected. . . .  There is a quiet, but very pleasant, readableness about the whole of this novel.” Spectator, December 7, 1901

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https://archive.org/details/thearbiteranovel24794gut
(These are links to text files, which you can download in a variety of formats.)

Novel 316: Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick, A Splendid Cousin (1892)

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A self-involved would-be musician bedevils her cousin’s life.

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Here is another novel by Sidgwick, for whom see Novels 082, 142, 200 and 258.

The title character is “an exaggeration” but “near enough . . . to a reality of the present day to be worth satirizing.” Bookman, January 1892

“It is a sombre tragedy, told with a simplicity and directness which heightens its effect. The obvious criticism that might be made is that all the characters are slightly exaggerated. . . . But this exaggeration, which would be a defect in a more elaborate book, really adds to the vividness of this short sketch; too much care bestowed on fine distinctions of light and shade would have weakened the strength and distinctness of the rapid impression so admirably given.” Athenaeum, January 14, 1892

A contrasting view:

“Ibsen-and-water.” Academy, January 21, 1892

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Novel 315: Laurence Brooke, Three Fair Daughters (1882)

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Three sisters’ marriage prospects are impaired by heavy encumbrances on the family estate.

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About Laurence Brooke nothing seems to be known, except that he wrote four novels between 1879 and 1882, of which this was the last.

“Mr. Brooke is without doubt a very vivacious writer, and he has well differentiated the separate individualities of his Three Fair Daughters.” Academy, July 8, 1882

“Mr. Brooke is content to build his story on the familiar lines; he aims at nothing extravagant or eccentric, and he achieves a decided success. . . . .  In fact, this is a novel which evidently shows real literary skill and no small acquaintance with his craft in its author.” Spectator, September 30, 1882

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https://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/44OXF_INST/35n82s/alma990144292480107026 (Right-click (or control-click, if you have a Mac) on the “view digitized copy” links to download the novel’s three volumes in pdf form)

Novel 314: Harold Frederic, Seth’s Brother’s Wife (1887)

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The sons of a New York farmer turn to journalism and politics, and one of them takes an unhealthy interest in another’s wife.

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For Frederic, see Novel 173.

Frederic shows “a knack of description which is clever and the reverse of wordy”; he is “a close and shrewd observer of certain human and natural phenomena.” Athenaeum, December 3, 1887

“Mr. Frederic’s novel is distinguished by its firm grasp of unhackneyed material, its realistic portraiture of life in a rural region, its repose of manner, its masterly dealing with unusual types without descent to caricature.” Literary World, December 10, 1887

“Very good indeed—simple but exceedingly workmanlike in construction, and with a really strong capable grasp of character.” Academy, December 17, 1887

“A capital story, full of point, vigour, humour, and dash.” Saturday Review, February 18, 1888

Despite the author’s inexperience, “there is no fumbling, tentative work; the author evidently knows just what he wants to do, and he does it simply and in a direct, businesslike fashion. The book has the fine finish which is characteristic of the work of the new American school of novelists, but Mr. Frederic, unlike some of his contemporaries, has provided himself with material which is worth finishing.” Spectator, February 25, 1888

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https://archive.org/details/sethsbrotherswif00fredrich/

Novel 313: Richard Pryce, Miss Maxwell’s Affections (1891)

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An aunt interferes in her niece’s love life.

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For Pryce, see Novel 122.

“The by-play in the romance is excellent, the story is brightly written, and the little touches of sarcasm are neatly injected.” New York Times, September 27, 1891

“A vigorously conceived and delicately finished work of art. . . . an unusually good novel.” Academy, October 10, 1891

“Mr. Richard Pryce has written two or three very clever books, but he has not previously given us anything that is at once so able and so pleasing as Miss Maxwell’s Affections.” It is “one of the most enjoyable of recent novels.  The portraits of women . . . are painted with such subtle truth that, had Miss Maxwell’s Affections been published anonymously, we should have had hardly any hesitation in assigning it to feminine authorship. . . .  The book is rich in humour, for the most part of the subtle rather than of the obvious self-advertising order, nor is it lacking in passages of very beautiful and winning tenderness and pathos.” Spectator, October 21, 1891

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Novel 312: May Laffan Hartley, Ismay’s Children (1887)

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In the south of Ireland, a disinherited family lives amid squalid poverty and futile political agitation.

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May Laffan Hartley (1850-1916) published several stories and five novels, of which this was the last; she struggled with mental illness and ended her life in a psychiatric asylum.

It is “marked to a singular extent by . . . strength, breadth of humour, and impartiality. . . . No one who is anxious to fathom the enigma of the Irish character will be deterred . . . from the careful study of what we have no hesitation in pronouncing to be the most valuable and dispassionate contribution towards the solution of that problem which has been put forth in this generation in the domain of fiction. . . . There is a ‘sweet wildness and unusualness’ about the scenes and characters in which we move which is distinctly captivating, and yet it is hard to say whether pain or pleasure predominates in the impression left on the mind after a perusal of the volumes. For the picture which the author gives of her compatriots is relentlessly faithful, and excites compassion and repulsion in an almost equal degree. The squalor, suspicion, and greed which are met at every turn in the mutual relations of the peasantry are illustrated with such a wealth of detail as can only be the outcome of intimate acquaintance and close observation. ‘Ismay’s Children’ contains a whole gallery of portraits, gentle and simple, some more elaborately finished than others, but of singularly uniform excellence. . . . These are living human beings who let us know what manner of men they are out of their own mouths. They are not mere lists of qualities catalogued by the author when they are severally introduced, but, as in real life, we only come to know them gradually. The pages of ‘Ismay’s Children’ are full of excellent sayings and characteristic anecdotes, all the more telling for the absence of any conscious effort to bring them in.” Athenaeum, October 15, 1887

Hartley “is as witty, as humorous, as keen-sighted, and, alas! as pessimist as ever. . . . She paints the foibles and faults of the people she knows so well with a brush steeped in black. . . . She is like the good housewife who boasted that, if she had no ear for music, she had a wonderful eye for dirt. . . . And what tends to intensify the reader’s despondency into despair is the apparent hopeless acquiescence of the author’s mind in the necessary perpetuation of the sores she probes so ruthlessly. She sees no possible cure. Her people are squalid, dirty, lying, superstitious, and dishonest. The meanest vices are made compatible with an unsimulated profession of piety and a fervid observance of the rules of the Church. Some of the most amiable and lovable of her personages are tainted with inherent insincerity and untruthfulness. Squalor is the one element she cannot omit from her canvas. If a hospitable priest or an amiable old lady offers her guests refreshment, the biscuits must be sodden and the seed-cake mouldy. . . . The author is absolutely just and fair-minded. Landlords and tenants, priests and parsons, are treated by her with the same placid, cruel impartiality. And yet, with the unpleasing materials she chooses to work upon, the author of Ismay’s Children gives us a novel which charms us in our own despite. If her pathos merges too readily into tragedy the gentler passion is never quite swallowed up by the sterner.” Saturday Review, November 19, 1887

“Though it has, as it could hardly fail to have, some gleams of very genuine humour, it is, as a whole, much too sad a book to be commended to people who demand cheerfulness in their reading; but those who are content to forego even cheerfulness for the sake of power, pathos, and unrelenting veracity of imagination, will find in Ismay’s Children a novel to their mind. . . . In spite of the gleams of gaiety which must find their way into any picture of Irish life, the book as a whole is a very sombre one. Still, sombre as it is, it is too rich in beauty, impressiveness, and pathos to be dismissed in any other words than those of grateful appreciation.” Spectator, November 26, 1887

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(Right-click (or control-click, if you have a Mac) on the links to download the novel’s three volumes in pdf form)

Novel 311: Moira O’Neill, An Easter Vacation (1893)

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A schoolmaster passes his vacation with an ailing student at a seaside resort and there meets an attractive pair of sisters.

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Moira O’Neill was the pen-name of Agnes Nesta Shakespeare Skrine, nee Higginson (1864-1955), an Irish poet who wrote just a few works of fiction, including this unassuming novella.

“Slight as is the story, at least it is a page out of real life, cleverly reflecting the conventions and tone of a highly respectable ‘set.’ . . .  What is sufficiently evident here is her power of watching and marking the finer play of certain minds with whom presumably she is in sympathy.” Bookman, April 1893

It is “a story about nothing in particular, and it amuses and pleases for no definite reason either. . . .  Man, from woman’s point of view, is treated with quiet sagacity and humour.” Athenaeum, April 8, 1893

“It is a novel with an attractive cultivated air, written in admirable English by a writer with a good knowledge of society, and with a keen eye for character”; there is no “aggressive display of cleverness, . . . it pleases in a quiet way by being always simply right.” Academy, April 15, 1893

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Novel 310: Mary E. Mann, A Winter’s Tale (1891)

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A gruff misogynist falls in love.

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For Mann, see Novels 016, 154, and 204.

“There is a certain measure of brightness and originality in ‘A Winter's Tale,’ though if judged by a mere outline of the plot it would seem commonplace enough. The story is not particularly pleasant; but several passages in it are entertaining and cleverly written.” Athenaeum, March 7, 1891

“Quite a delightful story.  The plot is slight, but the workmanship is delicate throughout, like a fine ivory carving.  With a few light illustrative touches she causes each of her characters to live—the dialogue has the sparkle and crispness of light everyday badinage.” Saturday Review, March 21, 1891

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Novel 309: Henry Harland, Grandison Mather (1889)

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In New York City, a young married man loses his fortune and is forced to make a living.

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“Bright, fresh, and interesting.” Academy, September 21, 1889

“A clever and lively novel”; the plot is “highly ingenious.” Athenaeum, March 1, 1889

“A lively story.” Saturday Review, July 19, 1889

A contrasting view:

“If we could hear such a tale, as agreeably told, some leisurely summer afternoon, we would not consider the twenty minutes required to tell it wasted by raconteur or audience.  But this is a printed book, 387 pages long, and there is a great deal we ought to read in this world, and very little time to do it in.” Hartford Courant, May 22, 1889

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Novel 308: Emily Lawless, A Chelsea Householder (1882)

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A young artist spends time painting in the New Forest, managing her house in Chelsea, and staying with her farmer grandfather in Norfolk.

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The Hon. Emily Lawless (1845-1913), daughter of an Irish baron, wrote some nine novels between 1892 and 1898.

“Cleverly written, with a good deal of natural aptitude and scarcely any sign of effort.  Both the subject and its treatment are fresh, and the story moves on smoothly and lightly.” Athenaeum, October 28, 1882

“The story . . . is essentially a pleasant one”; the title character’s “griefs are just sufficiently deep and prolonged to furnish that vital necessity for truth in the portraiture of human life, which all but the absolutely ignorant or the hopelessly silly must demand as a condition of their accepting the likeness at all; her virtues are attractive, but not overpowering, and her vexations are so amusing that one is sorry to part with them”; “The author has succeeded perfectly in making her heroine real to the reader”; “a very bright and pleasing novel.” Spectator, November 4, 1882

A contrasting view (from a critic who appears not to have read the novel, well over half of which is not set in London):

“A London novel, interminable as London streets and as generally dreary.” New York Times, May 27, 1883

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Novel 307: Charlotte Yonge, The Clever Woman of the Family (1865)

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A young woman thinks too well of herself.

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Here is another novel by the great Charlotte Yonge (for whom see Novels 003, 053, 103, 155, 210, and 261).

Yonge “spares no pains to discover fresh varieties of character, or to define them sharply and distinctly.  For these reasons her stories are generally worth a great deal of study. . . . ‘The Clever Woman of the Family’ is well written, and teaches a good moral. . . . Upon the whole . . . the book will be read with pleasure; and it has this great advantage over many recent novels, that the author has evidently had some personal acquaintance with the phases of society that she describes.” Athenaeum, April 8, 1865

“Unquestionably the best of her novels, and a book that any writer of the day might be proud to own.  In the management of a large family no one . . . is equal to Miss Yonge; she absolutely revels in the pranks and frolics of ten or a dozen brothers and sisters, all discriminated in character with a nicety of touch that belongs to a woman’s pen alone.” New York Times, June 19, 1865

A contrasting view:

“We are transported into a somewhat mawkish paradise of earnest people. . . . The purposeless anatomy of small feminine scruples and self-communings is carried out to a tedious extent.” Reader, May 27,1865

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v.1 https://archive.org/details/cleverwomanoffam01yong

v.2 https://archive.org/details/cleverwomanoffam02yong