John Bagnold Burgess, The Church Door
A young lady, neglectfully raised by her disreputable English father in Montevideo, finds herself in trying social circumstances.
Dorothy Boulger, née Havers (1847-1923) published some 17 works of fiction under the pen-name Theo Gift between 1874 and 1901. She spent her late teens and early twenties (1861-70) in Uruguay, a setting carefully realized, along with some convincingly conflicted characters, in Lil Lorimer
“A charming and romantic novel. . . . The . . . characters are invariably lifelike. . . . The author has painted South America with a realistic fidelity.” Morning Post, April 16, 1885
The “descriptions of Urugayan town and country life . . .have all the appearance of being reproduced from original experiences”; The plot is true “to the complex realities of life.” Graphic, May 16, 1885
“The descriptions of life in that part of South America are both instructive and entertaining. . . . The character-drawing . . . is also good, and the plot . . . is simple and natural. But the story depends for its interest less on dramatic episodes and startling surprises than on portrayal of character and analysis of motive.” Spectator, July 25, 1885
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