The Animal Hotel, by Jean Garrigue (1966)
“Once a bear kept a small inn for animals. Not many, just a mole or so, a chipmunk, a cat, several birds, a sheep and a deer. Wasps and bees, also inhabitants, didn’t count because …
Canal in Moonlight, by Kathleen Sully (1955)
“Bikka’s rats are large, fierce and tenacious. They find rich pickings in the garbage of the extravagant Bikka poor which nourishes bodies and whets appetites for yet more. Only the boldest or most foolhardy of …
Jack the Giant Killer in all his Gory Glory
Back in the days when the average lifespan was about 40 years, children’s books could be pretty brutal. Take the story of Jack the giant killer, which now we almost exclusively see in its vegan …
Stuart’s Hill, by Eleanor Saltzman (1945)
When I did the research for the recent post on novelist and poet Eleanor Saltzman, I had to make do with reading a copy of her first novel, Ever Tomorrow for an hour or so …
A Look at the Tadpoles, by Kathleen Sully (1970)
What a contrast between Kathleen Sully’s last novel, A Look at the Tadpoles, and her first, Canal in Moonlight (1955). Canal was about a family of umpteen kids living in rat-infested digs in the midst …
Merrily to the Grave, by Kathleen Sully (1958)
Kathleen Sully published 17 novels between 1955 and 1970. She was compared to Muriel Spark and Brigid Brophy. John Betjeman called her “above all things a born writer.” In 1960, John Davenport wrote, “If she …
The Flagellants, by Carlene Hatcher Polite (1967)
My annual visit to Montana was shorter than usual this year, but still I made sure to take a run out to the legendary Montana Valley Book Store in Alberton. I’ve been going through its …
Grand Concourse, by Eliot Wagner (1954)
From what I can determine, there are all of three available copies of Eliot Wagner’s first novel, Grand Concourse for sale. One goes for $25; a second for almost $650; and the third for nearly …
“Mrs. Ferris Next Door,” from The Kindness of Strangers, by Salka Viertel (1969)
If you loved Clive James’ Cultural Amnesia, you’re going to find Salka Viertel’s memoir, The Kindness of Strangers as addictive as a bag of potato chips. Born in Galicia–meaning Poland–er, now Ukraine, coming of age …
What’s Right with the World, by Marcus Bach (1973)
Marcus Bach was something like the Jan Morris of religion. Starting with They Have Found a Faith (1946), he wrote around a dozen books about his encounters with religions, cults, sects, and other groups of …
“The Black Day,” from Collected Poems (1917-1952) by Archibald MacLeish
The Black Day to the memory of Lawrence Duggan God help that country where informers thrive Where slander flounshes and lies contrive To kill by whispers Where men lie to live! God help that country …
Eleanor Saltzman, Novelist and Poet
In and among all the dispiriting and infuriating news we’ve been exposed to lately, several efforts to recognize the work of some women writers have provided some refreshing and inspiring relief. Last week, the Paris …
A Little to the East, by Robert Cenedella (1963)
Robert Cenedella spent a lifetime writing, but A Little to the East was the one and only novel he ever published. Cenedella began writing short stories as a high school English teacher, got some of …
Murder City, by O. M. Hall (Oakley Hall) (1949)
Murder City was Oakley Hall’s first novel, published under the name of “O. M. Hall.” Although Hall came to be known as the dean of Western writers, particularly based on his 1958 novel, Warlock, he …
A Visit from Venus, by Ronald Fraser (1958)
How to describe A Visit from Venus? How about P. G. Wodehouse meets Olaf Stapledon? This assumes people recognize Stapledon, a contemporary of Wodehouse’s who wrote cosmic fantasies that swept the reader through spans of …
You Can’t Tell a Belmont Book by Looking at the Cover
Lurid covers full of sexual innuendos and implications of violence were the primary marketing tool for cheap paperback books back in the 1950s and 1960s, and few publishers were more lurid and cheaper in their …
Christina Stead recommends a “Romance of Tasmania”
In a letter to poet and dramatist Ettore Rella that appears in Talking into the Typewriter: Selected Letters (1973-1983), Christina Stead recommends a long-forgotten novel by Australian writer William Hay first published in 1918: I …
Gloria Swanson, from Doug and Mary, by Allene Talmey (1927)
Alone, she persuaded Wall Street bankers to finance her unit, Gloria Swanson, Inc., to the extent of $1,200,000, taking as consideration her box office record and her insurance policies of several million dollars. Alone, she …
Of Princesses and their Memoirs
Just in case the newest addition to the British Royal Family, the Duchess of Sussex, is in need of some self-help reading, here is a tiara-full of memoirs written by princesses from the past. • …
John Quill, from Weeds of Witchery, by Thomas Haynes Bayly (1837)
John Quill John Quill was clerk to Robert Shark, a legal man was he, As dull, obscure, and technical as legal man could be; And, perch’d before his legal desk, Quill learnt the legal rules …