I really think that _The World of Wonderful Reality_ (HODDER AND STOUGHTON) may come to be something of a test for your true follower of Mr. E. TEMPLE THURSTON. You recall the ingredients that went towards the first, or _Beautiful Nonsense_, book? Sentiment in the slums, Venice with a very big V and poverty _passim_ might be regarded as its composition. Well, here you have _John_ and _Jill_ home again; no more Venice, a palpably decreasing sentiment and only poverty to fill up with. I am bound to confess that I found _John's_ protracted preparation for his nuptials rather less than enough as subject-matter for a whole book. Of course all this time there remained _Amber_ (you recollect her; she "also ran" for the _John_ stakes), and at the back of your mind a comfortable conviction that two strings are still better than one. Having censured the book for insufficient plot, I had better not proceed to give away what there is. I will content myself with a personal doubt as to whether _John_ and _Jill_ will quite reduplicate their former triumph--and that for various reasons, not least because (for purposes of sequel, I suppose) even _Jill_ herself has been permitted so grave a lapse from the attitude of stand-anything-so-long-as- it's-slummy-enough that so endeared her to her former public. Touch that and the bloom is indeed gone.
_With the Chinks_ (LANE), a volume of the "Active Service Series," treats of the training of Chinese coolies for work with the Labour Corps in the B.E.F. The special interest of the racial type was, for me, exhausted by the charming photographs; the task remaining for Mr. DARYL KLEIN, Lieutenant in the Chinese Labour Corps, of so conveying the atmosphere as to absorb the reader's attention, was not achieved. On the two main aspects of the topic, the origin in China and the result in France, he makes no serious attempt. I got no clear impression of the coolie at home or of why he took to being an ally, and I was left with but the vaguest conception of the unit in France, since the narrative ended at the disembarcation. Lastly, I have with regret to complain of one sentence in particular, where he tells us: "It is high time I said something about the officers." He had, from the general reader's point of view, already said too much. It is a pity to have to speak thus moderately of a war-book obviously written with care and treating of an enterprise which must have cost much labour in the achieving and, in the achievement, must have duly contributed to our victory. For those personally involved it will be a welcome memento. For the conscientious historian it will have a certain unique value. And in fairness it must be added that in the latter half there are touches of humour and humanity which make the reading easy and pleasant.