Thomas Benjamin Kennington, Reading the Letter
Two cousins, one mercurial, the other slow but sure, quarrel over a woman, with surprising, mostly comic, consequences.
Arthur R. Conder (1876-1901), barely out of college when he wrote this novel, died shortly after its completion of heart failure. Read it, and you will join contemporary reviewers in their regret that he did not live to enjoy a long career.
“The plot is entirely diverting if not altogether probable. . . . The writer regards his characters with a whimsical sympathy and has been able to make them eccentric and lovable at the same time. . . . The quaint architecture of this little book is beyond criticism—compact, peculiar, facetious.” Chicago Tribune, July 18, 1901
“It is full of quiet humor, keen characterization and a certain freshness which is all too rare among the novels of the day.” Baltimore Sun, August 15, 1901
“The plot . . . is good, and the interest is well maintained; but it is in the freshness of the treatment, the briskness of the narrative, the excellent characterisation—a certain individualizing of every-day characters—that the great charm and merit of the book lie.” Bookman, October 1901
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