Books: Beginners

THE BEGINNERS—Henry Kitchell Webster—Bobbs-Merrill ($2.50). Edward Patterson, 45, married, father of Edith and Edward, suddenly breaks with a frantic gesture out of the insurance business by means of which he has been supporting his family in good style. Eagerness for variety makes him go so far as to try to sell a mechanical device for automobiles. Poor returns on this venture make it necessary for his daughter to leave school, his son to work through college. Edward Patterson gives up. He makes amends to his wife who resents his incipient affair with Ruth Ingraham, returns to insurance selling and normality. The result of this is a novel that proves little. Nevertheless, handicapped by the mediocrity of his theme, Author Webster, who as a novelist is no beginner, achieves a story which is characteristically well-built and worth reading.