THE TRESPASSERS

I think this has a good chance for a wide public, -- Nancy Hale, Martha Davenport sort of public. I found it absorbing reading -- good characterization, and a theme running through that is an integral part of the world pattern -- the ever-pressing problem of the unwanted aliens, caught in the web of inflexible officialdom and a basically unreceptive mood. There are several facets to the panorama, but ultimately they are brought together. The two main channels are these:- the Frans Vederles, Austrian, Aryan but wholly out of sympathy with the Nasi regime, and determinedly seeking a way out; Vera Marriner Stanford, successful career woman, who needs a new outlet, something more vital than her job, and Jasper Crown, ambitious, ruthless radio magnate-in-the-making, ready for a serious love affair, but unready to give of himself in permanent bonds of matrimony. Both had made failures of marriage, Vera is divorced, Jasper has never ""bothered"" -- and they think they have found the answer in each other. Then Jasper confesses his sterility, and Vera, determined that this fear be lifted if science can do it, urges new steps -- and eventually finds proof of success in the fact of her pregnancy. Then the test of Jasper's integrity -- and Vera's house of cards collapses. Ultimately, through the Vederles, for whose entry she had vouched -- and through the long and heart-breaking struggle against red tape, she finds herself again. The story is tightly reasoned, convincingly developed and honestly evolved. The viewpoint may be considered shocking by conservatives, no doubt -- but there is nothing in the handling that can be termed salacious. Occasionally, Miss Hobson cannot resist giving vent to her indignation, her awareness of the fallacies of a blind world -- but she does it so challengingly that she drives her points home unerringly. In no other book that I have read, have I found myself so completely aware of the human tragedy of those individuals uprooted from their homes, thrust upon a hostile, unfriendly world. It is sympathetically, but not sentimentally or emotionally handled. Here's a book worth going to bat for -- a book that has a real chance.