HARVEST IN THE NORTH

by James Lansdale Hodson ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 17, 1934

Here's a book that should have tremendous appeal to those who like Bentley's Inheritance. There is, too, something of the tradition of Arnold Bennett's Old Wives' Tale, in the illuminating picture of what goes on behind the scenes in an industrial center of northern England. The setting is Lancashire, and the textile district, during the boom days following the war, and the tragic collapse of the whole industry. The focus shifts from one group to another:- from the mill owner, his wife, his daughter, and the son whose life is out of tune since he came back, crippled from the war; to the household of a spinner who gambles and wins and gambles again and loses, and whose life tries to hold their little world from crashing completely. And into the pattern is woven, too, the thread of the lovely mill hand who makes a small success on the stage, of Brierley, descended on the wrong side of the blanket from the stock from which the town's patricians come; of other single figures, here and there, -- a complex pattern. In its very complexity lies its fascination, in that rather than in any one story. And through this little bit of England, one gets a picture of the problems of post-war life, with its rhythms tangled and its melodies out of key. Watch this. It might get a good break.

Pub Date: Sept. 17, 1934

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Knopf

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1934

Categories: FICTION