A SMALL PIECE OF PARADISE

That Small Piece of Paradise refers to the junkyard-fronted plot that Mr. Penny and Joe fight to save when big business (Mr. Massiter) threatens to turn out their garden and its animals for a skyscraper. The idea may be newer in London where the story is set but it has an over-familiar ring here with no novelty to compensate. Leaving the shabby East End to plead his case at the Massiter mansion in posh N.W.1, Joe finds contempt from the Treacherous butler (who still uses words like ""urchin"") but an ally in the master's wife -- seems industrialists have no time for families either, another oft-met theme. The Massiters legally separate and the Mrs. joins Joe and Mr. Penny but the fight seems hopeless. The land is saved not through legal maneuvers but as a memorial to Mr. Penny: he dies when his house collapses during a storm, and the newspaper reporters take it from there. Neither mod nor rocker (closer to rocking chair), this is a minor skirmish compared to more cultivated and enterprising crusades (e.g. McNeill's The Battle of St. George Without, p. 272, J-100) even if the background posters reflect the recent scene.