10 Edward Arnold dh Co.'s Autumn Announcements. 



to the experience of the reader. The story is Hghtly and amusingly 

 told while developing a situation that becomes increasingly excit- 

 ing. It begins quietly with the appearance of a stranger, Andrew 

 Redman, who takes a furnished cottage in Sussex to recover from 

 a nervous breakdown. He becomes acquainted with his neighbours, 

 in particular with the Vicar, who is morbidly interested in Spiritual- 

 ism, and with Miss Charlotte Masters, who Hves there with her grand- 

 parents. Charlotte is regarded by the Vicar as a promising medium, 

 and by Redman with eyes of love. Gradually the reader perceives 

 that Redman is living under an assumed name, and learns that his 

 breakdown was caused by circumstances not unconnected with the 

 Vicar's mental disturbance. Redman's identity, when revealed, 

 adds to the difficulty of his winning Charlotte. But a more terrible 

 obstacle arises through the menacing attitude of the Vicar, whose 

 delusions rapidly develop into mania and bring about a catastrophe 

 in which Charlotte barely escapes a horrible death. The story is 

 ■carefully constructed and interesting from start to finish. 



THE PAPER MOON. 



By L. C. HOBART, 



^ Author op " The Silken Scarp." 



Crown 8vo. 7s. 6d. net. 



Miss Hobart's second novel is in every way stronger and more in- 

 teresting than her first. The plot is weU constructed and developed 

 with much emotional power. She has the gift of bringing her charac- 

 ters and their setting vividly before the reader, and communicates 

 the strong sympathy and antipathy she herself feels for them. 



The book opens amid idyllic surroundings on Dartmoor, but the 

 scene soon shifts to a certain house in Chelsea, in outward appear- 

 ance not different from its neighbours, but pregnant with some 

 strange uncanny influence, some dimly apprehended evil lurking 

 in the background, waiting for the moment of consummation. 

 This malign atmosphere, the tense expectancy, the breathless 

 suspense, Miss Hobart renders most vividly. 



The inhabitants of the house are Jonathan Fane and his son 

 Greville ; from them also there seems to emanate a mysterious sug- 

 gestion of hidden evil, of menace that may become reality. Greville 

 is the villain of the story : he is a man who exercises irresistible 

 iascination over the opposite sex, and first April Arless, then Rachel 

 Strangways fall victims to his Mephistophelean attractions. In strong 

 contrast with Greville is his cousin, Jake Fane, who is also in love 

 with Rachel, and the characters of these two men typify the forces 

 of good and evil which contend for mastery throughout the book. 



