Books: Smalltown Actress

PRESENTING LILY MARS—Booth Tarkington—Doubleday, Doran ($2.50). Author Tarkington's memory, straying fondly over his own early love for the stage, has lingered long enough to inspire a sentimental romance about the U. S. theatre some 20 years ago. Presenting Lily Mars concerns a Southern smalltown girl whose untutored genius as an actress the story never manages to make remotely plausible. Flirtatious Lily had never gone further than high school lessons in elocution, consequently enjoyed a fixed conviction that she was destined for high success on the New York stage. Her conviction is...