Here's a contribution to the study of the English novel which is certain to raise a store of protest from some of the diehards of the old school, who insist that the novel started with Richardson, Fielding and Smolliet, and who will question the precedence of Chaucer, Malory, Lyly and Sidney, and Defoe, in a book on the novel. Also they will quarrel with exclusions. But, in his arrangement, in his choice of contributors, Derek Verschoyle has given challenge to the conventional viewpoint. A group of current novelists have made the survey. The result is interesting, and good reading for those concerned with the subject.