Life — December 27, 1923 — page 24: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

N “A Guide for the Greedy” (Lip- | pincott), Elizabeth Robins Pen- nell grows positively lyrical on the subject of things to eat, so don't think of picking it up until you have just meal equivalent in weight to a Thanks- Citi- are warned against it, for how- bravely they survive the introduc- tion with its about the astounding number of cookery books in the world. they will break down finished a giving spread. zens on a diet herewith ever news completely when they the chapter called “The Subtle Sandwich,” and make reach a bee line for the ice- box. Heavy feeders who are subject at times shame will e great comfort from “A Guide for the Greedy.” The very first sentence is: Gluttony is ranked with the deadly sins; it should be honored among the cardinal virtues.” Many wom- en will give up min- eral mud and go in for properly assem- bled square meals when they learn that gluttony is the best cosmetic in the world. And this book is just the thing to give to friends who are departing on the Leviathan, as most of the Lucullan dishes over which Mrs. Pennell rhapsodizes called by their French names. It con- tains one startling piece of misinforma- are tion, however, in its definition of Amer- ican strawberry shortcake as_ berries between sponge cake. HE TEMPTRESS,” by Blasco Ibaiiez (Dutton), is high caloric material. Its heroine, so to speak, is a composite picture in lure and fascination of Cleopatra, Helen of Troy, the Lorelei and Peggy Hopkins Joyce. The best Sefior Ibafiez can do with such a siren is to take her out of Paris in the opening chapters and drop SANTA CLAUS her down in a South neering camp, where even a maiden with Ben Turpin’s eyes and a slight limp would have needed an 8 x 12 en- gagement book. When Elena strikes the engineers’ rough settlement, they are all writing home to their families and enclosing money orders, but she hasn’t been there a week before they are sending to Buenos Aires and other distant spots for perfumes and hot-house flowers and doing their best to throw a fair imitation of dressing for dinner. Only two men in the vicinity fail to American engi- fall for her—the friend of Elena’s hus- band, who took them down there after their fortunes crashed in Paris, and the stalwart young American. Even the young American slips a little. Heated rivalry is the natural outcome of all this vamping, and al- most before Elen herself knows it, shots are being fired and blood shed among strong men who havc been friends for years through untold hardships, and the plot gets so thick that the author can’t do « thing but suddenly skip a few years. H brings Robledo, the friend of Elena’s husband, back to Paris and has him accosted. during an afternoon stroll, by a bedraggled prostitute. And who do you think it was? Right you are! Z A Ze Tai whan “BIRTH” (Maemil- lan), is the best novel Zona Gale ever wrote, and oddly enough it predates both “Miss Lulu Bett’ and “Faint Perfume.” It was published in 1918 and through one of the curious mis- chances of _ literary criticism failed to at- tain the publicity and recognition which it deserved. As a novel of a small Western town, it has “Main Street” beaten two miles. Asan assemblage of types, it is a living-picture gallery of the eighties. And it has a characterization, Marshall Pitt, which will literally wring your heart. It has humor, truth—well, it has about every- thing a novel should have, including a which I liked extremely: “There were such multitudes of Gala- hads in knickerbockers and so few with gray hairs. (Continued on page 29) sentence comicbooks.com