THREE CAME HOME

Here's the story of what happened to the author of Land Below the Wind when the Japs overran Borneo. The audience fascinated by the earlier book will find the merest hint of that contagious enthusiasm, that love of the country she had made her own, that at-one-ness with her husband, who was in the British forestry service- a hint in the opening chapters of the book, when baby George is born and the little family rejoices in the present joys, while recognizing the cloud on the horizon. Then everything changes- the Japs come- the Keiths are separated, Harry to go the to one concentration camp, Agnes and the baby to another. A grim picture, with nothing of beauty left; a picture of filth and hunger and scarcely existent clothing, of fear and disgust, of strained human relations -- and of the rare and risky meetings at night, when momentary escape would pass unnoticed. This isn't as horrifying a story as some we have had; probably the prison camps off Borneo were gentle in comparison to some. But everything is here, in human terms, written with the sense of story and drama, the occasional flashes of humor, that are characteristic of Agnes Keith's writing. Some of the chapters have appeared in the Atlantic. The sale will be largely to those who want to read anything she writes, but the hurdle of a war story is there.