Blue Castle

You'll be liable to shy off at that title and say: "e;No more 'glad' books for me! I'm growing up!"e; But you'll be making a big mistake if you do. "e;The Blue Castle"e; is grown-up, too. And aside from being poignantly human, it is almost poetically beautiful in parts. "e;Moonlight on birches in a silver thaw. Ragged shadows on windy evenings - torn, twisted, fantastic shadows. Great silences, austere and searching. Jeweled, barbaric hills, and icy-grey twilights, broken by snowsqualls. Doesn't that have twice the color, twice the beauty and rhythm that five sixths of the "e;verse libre"e; printed today attains? And the story is fascinating. It's about Valancy Stirling, who for the twenty-nine years of her life has been tied down by fear. Fear of criticism, fear of her mother, fear of her whole "e;tribe."e; And when she finds that she has only a year to live she breaks away; defies them all. She goes to the home of Roaring Abel, an old reprobate, and takes care of his daughter, a poor little waif with an illegitimate child. And she proposes marriage to Barney Snaith, a man about whom nothing is known but much is said. Then life starts for Valancy, and for the reader too; mystery, love, humor and pathos. And when you finish it, it leaves you with all the most delightful sensations - the thrill of first love; the splendor of mountains and trees; the feeling that God is very close when the sky is so blue.