SALLY TAIT

I don't know quite what to say about this book. Of course we can assume the little poor girl may like to read about the little rich girl, but this particular little rich girl, with her plethora of presents, her lavish birthday party, her fabulous Christmas party, seems just too plush when presented as if this was routine for an ordinary little girl in a clean pinny. The one unpleasantness is the diphtheria blackout- but the rest of this year of 1912 and 1913 in Oleandar Isle, Texas, is strictly hothouse. Nostalgic looking backward, but lacking the might-be-true identification value which made a book like Roller Skates by Ruth Sawyer a memorable experience in recapturing a time and place. Eileen Evans' drawings in very open line seem thin and insubstantial. A disappointing book from an author who has given us better books.