Books: Dear Doctor

WE ARE NOT ALONE—James Hilton— Little, Brown ($2).

First-line critics do not admit that James Hilton (Lost Horizon, Goodbye, Mr. Chips) has anything more or better than 1) an ability to write smooth narrative; 2) an infectious British sentimentality. But such cat-laughs have been drowned out by the popular verdict. All but the most sea-green critics would agree that to have two novels simultaneously reproduced in the cinema* is equivalent to one plaster bust in the Hall of Fame. Last week Author Hilton put out his latest little number, the first to appear in...