(4 of 4)
What will be the six or the ten best sellers for the coming year? Nobody knows and everyone seems to care. Only two seem almost certain of the widest popularity—The Mine with the Iron Door (Harold Bell Wright) and The White Flag (Eleanor H. Porter). Both authors sell by the carload rather than the volume; their publishers are always sittin' pretty financially. And then there is The Bover by Joseph Conrad, now running serially in the Pictorial Eeview, to be published probably this Winter—and Charles G. Norris, addicted to monosyllabic titles, will produce this month a little thing called Bread —and there are others—oh, yus— many old familiar faces will be with us again in the Fall. But what of the unexpected—the unforeseen ? Will the season of 1923-24 see a new If Winter Comes, a new Main Street, by an author heretofore not in the best seller class leap _ to instant, overpowering popularity? And if so what, which, how, who?
Is the wave of realism ebbing or isn't it? Are we in for a tremendous revival of Romance or are we not? Poor publishers—they see a book that ten years ago might have been a knockout from the point of view of sales stick on their shelves like fly paper—another which they thought would hardly pay for its binding bound to dazzling success. The publishing of fiction is a tremendous, enthralling gamble—a continual laying of bets as to which way that nervous and feline creature, Popular Taste, is going to jump. And, generally, it jumps the other way. For the average novel hardly recoups its publisher for his initial expenses—if that. Or so they tell the author. But the exceptional novel—Gosh, how the money rolls in!
Though it is undoubtedly unwise to try to make any prophecies as to 100,000-sellers for the Fall, it is sane enough perhaps to attempt to point the modest finger of discrimination at some few novels which seem worth recommending to the judicious reader, sight unseen. Imprimis, The Rover, by Conrad. And The Blind Bow-Boy which Carl Van Vechten, its author, describes as " a cartoon for a stained glass window," whatever that means. Jennifer Larne, a sedate extravaganza by Elinor Wylie. And the new Hergesheimer if it's the one we think it is. Meanwhile, the literary roulette-wheel spins.
"Messieurs—Mesdames—faites vos jeux!" S. V. B.
* THE MINE WITH THE IRON DOOE—Harold Bell Wright—Appleton ($2.00).