The Girl Crusoes Part 40

Nina's Career

Ill.u.s.trated in Colour by JAMES DURDEN. Crown 8vo, cloth elegant, gilt edges, 6s.

The modern Louisa Alcott! That is the t.i.tle that critics in England and America have bestowed on Miss Christina Gowans Whyte, whose "Story-Book Girls" they declare to be the best girls' story since "Little Women." Mrs. E. Nesbit, author of "The Would-be Goods," in likening Miss Whyte to Louisa Alcott, wrote: "This is high praise--but not too high." "Nina's Career" tells delightfully of a large family of girls and boys, children of Sir Christopher Howard, the famous surgeon.

Friends of the Howards are Nina Wentworth, who lives with three aunts, and Gertrude Mannering. Gertrude, because she is the daughter of the Mrs. Mannering and grand-daughter of a peer, is conscious of always missing in her life that which makes the lives of the Howards so joyous and full. They may have "careers"; she must go to Court and through the wearying treadmill of the rich girls. The Howards get engaged, marry, go into hospitals, study in art schools; and in the end Gertrude also achieves happiness.

_Outlook_.--"We have been so badly in need of writers for girls who shall be in sympathy with the modern standard of intelligence, that we are grateful for the advent of Miss Whyte, who has not inaptly been described as the new Miss Alcott."

The Story-Book Girls

By CHRISTINA GOWANS WHYTE.

Ill.u.s.trated in Colour by JAMES DURDEN. Cloth elegant, 6s.

This story won the 100 prize in the Bookman compet.i.tion.

The Leightons are a charming family. There is Mabel, the beauty, her nature strength and sweetness mingled; and Jean, the downright, blunt, uncompromising; and Elma, the sympathetic, who champions everybody, and has a weakness for long words. And there is Cuthbert, too, the clever brother. Cuthbert is responsible for a good deal, for he saves Adelaide Maud from an accident, and brings the Story-Book Girls into the story. Every girl who reads this book will become acquainted with some of the realest, truest, best people in recent fiction.

By WINIFRED M. LETTS

The Quest of the Blue Rose

Ill.u.s.trated in Colour by JAMES DURDEN. Crown 8vo, cloth, olivine edges, 5s.

After the death of her mother, Sylvia Sherwood has to make her own way in the world as a telegraph clerk. The world she finds herself in is a girls' hostel in a big northern city. For a while she can only see the uncongenial side of her surroundings; but when she has made a friend and found herself a niche, she begins to realise that though the Blue Rose may not be for her finding, there are still wild roses in every hedge. In the end, however, Sylvia, contented at last with her hard-working, humdrum life, finds herself the successful writer of a book of children's poems.

_Daily News_.--"It is a successful effort in realism, a book of live human beings that beyond its momentary interest, which is undoubted, will leave a lasting and valuable impression."

By ELSIE J. OXENHAM

Mistress Nanciebel

Ill.u.s.trated in Colour by JAMES DURDEN. Crown 8vo, cloth, olivine edges, 5s.

This is a story of the Restoration. Nanciebel's father, Sir John Seymour, had so incurred the displeasure of King Charles by his persistent opposition to the threatened war against the Dutch, that he was sent out of the country. Nothing would dissuade Nanciebel from accompanying him, so they sailed away together and were duly landed on a desolate sh.o.r.e, which they afterwards discovered to be a part of Wales. Here, by perseverance and much hard toil, John o' Peace made a new home for his family, in which enterprise he owed not a little to the presence and constant help of Nanciebel, who is the embodiment of youthful optimism and womanly tenderness.

By E. EVERETT-GREEN

Our Great Undertaking

Ill.u.s.trated. 5s.

Miss Evelyn Everett-Green is one of the first favourites with girls and boys. This is how she tells about the beginning of "Our Great Undertaking." The children have been asking granny for a story:--"Well, my dears, I will see what I can do. You shall come to me at this time to-morrow night, and I will tell you the story of how, when I was a little girl, we children undertook what seemed to many people at the outset a labour of Hercules, and how we learned from it a number of lessons, which have lasted us through life." The grandmother smiles as the happy children troop off to bed, and in these pages Miss Everett-Green tells us the delightful story that grandmother told next day.

By M. QUILLER-COUCH

The Carroll Girls

Ill.u.s.trated. 5s.

The father of the Carroll girls fell into misfortune, and had to go to Canada to make a new start. But he could not take his girls with him, and they were left in charge of their cousin Charlotte, in whose country home they grew up, learning to be patient, industrious, and sympathetic. The author has a dainty and pleasant touch, and describes her characters so lovingly that no girl can read this book without keen interest in Esther's housekeeping and Penelope's music, Angela's poultry-farming, and Poppy's dreams of market gardening.

By E. L. HAVERFIELD

Audrey's Awakening

Ill.u.s.trated in Colour by JAMES DURDEN. Crown 8vo, cloth, olivine edges, 3s. 6d.

As a result of a luxurious and conventional upbringing, Audrey is a girl without ambitions, unsympathetic, and with a reputation for exclusiveness. Therefore, when Paul Forbes becomes her stepbrother, and brings his free-and-easy notions into the Davidsons' old home, there begins to be trouble. Audrey discovers that she has feelings, and the results are not altogether pleasant. She takes a dislike to Paul at the outset; and the young people have to get through deep waters and some exciting times before things come right. Audrey's awakening is thorough, if painful.

_Glasgow Herald_.--"Very pleasantly written and thoroughly healthy."

The Conquest of Claudia.

Ill.u.s.trated in Colour by JAMES DURDEN. Crown 8vo, cloth elegant, olivine edges, 3s. 6d.

Meta and Claudia Austin are two motherless girls with a much-occupied father. Their upbringing has therefore been left to a kindly governess, whose departure to be married makes the first change in the girls' lives. Having set their hearts upon going to school, they receive a new governess resentfully. Claudia is a person of instincts, and it does not take her long to discover that there is something mysterious about Miss Strongitharm. A clue upon which the children stumble leads to the notion that Miss Strongitharm is a Nihilist in hiding. That in spite of various strange happenings they are quite wrong is to be expected, but there is a genuine mystery about Miss Strongitharm which leads to some unforeseen adventures.

_School Guardian_.--"A fascinating story of girl life."

Dauntless Patty

Ill.u.s.trated in Colour by DUDLEY TENNANT. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, olivine edges, 3s. 6d.

The joys and sorrows, friends.h.i.+ps and disappointments--all the trifles, in fact, which make the sum of schoolgirl life--are faithfully delineated in this story. Patricia Garnett, an Australian girl, comes over to England to complete her education. She is unconventional and quite unused to English ways, and it is not long before she finds herself the most unpopular girl in the school. Several times she reveals her courage and high spirit, particularly in saving the life of Kathleen Lane, a girl with whom she is on very bad terms. All overtures of peace fail, however, for Patty feels that the other girls have no real liking for her and she refuses to be patronised. Thus, chiefly owing to misunderstanding and careless gossip, the feud is continued to the end of the term; and the climax of the story is reached when, in a cave in the face of a cliff, in imminent danger of being drowned, Patty and Kathleen for the first time understand each other, and lay the foundations of a lifelong friends.h.i.+p.

_Schoolmaster_.--"A thoroughly faithful and stimulating story of schoolgirl life."