BY HELEN CAMPBELL,
AUTHOR OF "THE WHAT-TO-DO CLUB," "MRS. HERNDON"S INCOME," "PRISONERS OF POVERTY."
"Mrs. Helen Campbell has written "Miss Melinda"s Opportunity" with a definite purpose in view, and this purpose will reveal itself to the eyes of all of its philanthropic readers. The true aim of the story is to make life more real and pleasant to the young girls who spend the greater part of the day toiling in the busy stores of New York. Just as in the "What-to-do Club" the social level of village life was lifted several grades higher, so are the little friendly circles of shop-girls made to enlarge and form clubs in "Miss Melinda"s Opportunity.""--_Boston Herald._
""Miss Melinda"s Opportunity," a story by Helen Campbell, is in a somewhat lighter vein than are the earlier books of this clever author; but it is none the less interesting and none the less realistic. The plot is unpretentious, and deals with the simplest and most conventional of themes; but the character-drawing is uncommonly strong, especially that of Miss Melinda, which is a remarkably vigorous and interesting transcript from real life, and highly finished to the slightest details. There is much quiet humor in the book, and it is handled with skill and reserve. Those who have been attracted to Mrs. Campbell"s other works will welcome the latest of them with pleasure and satisfaction."--_Sat.u.r.day Gazette._
"The best book that Helen Campbell has yet produced is her latest story, "Miss Melinda"s Opportunity," which is especially strong in character-drawing, and its life sketches are realistic and full of vigor, with a rich vein of humor running through them. Miss Melinda is a dear lady of middle life, who has finally found her opportunity to do a great amount of good with her ample pecuniary means by helping those who have the disposition to help themselves. The story of how some bright and energetic girls who had gone to New York to earn their living put a portion of their earnings into a common treasury, and provided themselves with a comfortable home and good fare for a very small sum per week, is not only of lively interest, but furnishes hints for other girls in similar circ.u.mstances that may prove of great value. An unpretentious but well-sustained plot runs through the book, with a happy ending, in which Miss Melinda figures as the angel that she is."--_Home Journal._
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY, BOSTON.
THE WHAT-TO-DO CLUB
A STORY FOR GIRLS
BY HELEN CAMPBELL.
""The What-to-do Club" is an unpretending story. It introduces us to a dozen or more village girls of varying ranks. One has had superior opportunities; another exceptional training; two or three have been "away to school;" some are farmers" daughters; there is a teacher, two or three poor self-supporters,--in fact, about such an a.s.semblage as any town between New York and Chicago might give us. But while there is a large enough company to furnish a delightful coterie, there is absolutely no social life among them.... Town and country need more improving, enthusiastic work to redeem them from barrenness and indolence. Our girls need a chance to do independent work, to study practical business, to fill their minds with other thoughts than the petty doings of neighbors. A What-to-do Club is one step toward higher village life. It is one step toward disinfecting a neighborhood of the poisonous gossip which floats like a pestilence around localities which ought to furnish the most desirable homes in our country.""--_The Chautauquan._
""The What-to-do Club" is a delightful story for girls, especially for New England girls, by Helen Campbell. The heroine of the story is Sybil Waite, the beautiful, resolute, and devoted daughter of a broken-down but highly educated Vermont lawyer. The story shows how much it is possible for a well-trained and determined young woman to accomplish when she sets out to earn her own living, or help others.
Sybil begins with odd jobs of carpentering, and becomes an artist so woodwork. She is first jeered at, then admired, respected, and finally loved by a worthy man. The book closes pleasantly with John claiming Sybil as his own. The labors of Sybil and her friends and of the New Jersey "Busy Bodies," which are said to be actual facts, ought to encourage many young women to more successful compet.i.tion in the battles of life.""--_Golden Rule._
"In the form of a story, this book suggests ways in which young women may make money at home, with practical directions for so doing.
Stories with a moral are not usually interesting, but this one is an exception to the rule. The narrative is lively, the incidents probable and amusing, the characters well-drawn, and the dialects various and characteristic. Mrs. Campbell is a natural storyteller, and has the gift of making a tale interesting. Even the recipes for pickles and preserves, evaporating fruits, raising poultry, and keeping bees, are made poetic and invested with a certain ideal glamour, and we are thrilled and absorbed by an array of figures of receipts and expenditures, equally with the changeful incidents of flirtation, courtship, and matrimony. Fun and pathos, sense and sentiment, are mingled throughout, and the combination has resulted in one of the brightest stories of the season."--_Woman"s Journal._
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY, BOSTON.
MRS. HERNDON"S INCOME.
A NOVEL.
BY HELEN CAMPBELL.
AUTHOR OF "THE WHAT-TO-DO CLUB."
"Confirmed novel-readers who have regarded fiction as created for amus.e.m.e.nt and luxury alone, lay down this book with a new and serious purpose in life. The social scientist reads it, and finds the solution of many a tangled problem; the philanthropist finds in it direction and counsel. A novel written with a purpose, of which never for an instant does the author lose sight, it is yet absorbing in its interest. It reveals the narrow motives and the intrinsic selfishness of certain grades of social life; the corruption of business methods; the "false, fairy gold," of fashionable charities, and "advanced"
thought. Margaret Wentworth is a typical New England girl, reflective, absorbed, full of pa.s.sionate and repressed intensity under a quiet and apparently cold exterior. The events that group themselves about her life are the natural result of such a character brought into contact with real life. The book cannot be too widely read."--_Boston Traveller._
"If the "What-to-do Club" was clever, this is decidedly more so. It is a powerful story, and is evidently written in some degree, we cannot quite say how great a degree, from fact. The personages of the story are very well drawn,--indeed, "Amanda Briggs" is as good as anything American fiction has produced. We fancy we could pencil on the margin the real names of at least half the characters. It is a book for the wealthy to read that they may know something that is required of them, because it does not ignore the difficulties in their way, and especially does not overlook the differences which social standing puts between cla.s.s and cla.s.s. It is a deeply interesting story considered as mere fiction, one of the best which has lately appeared.
We hope the auth.o.r.ess will go on in a path where she has shown herself so capable."--_The Churchman._
"In Mrs. Campbell"s novel we have a work that is not to be judged by ordinary standards. The story holds the reader"s interest by its realistic pictures of the local life around us, by its constant and progressive action, and by the striking dramatic quality of scenes and incidents, described in a style clear, connected, and harmonious. The novel-reader who is not taken up and made to share the author"s enthusiasm before getting half-way through the book must possess a taste satiated and depraved by indulgence in exciting and sensational fiction. The earnestness of the author"s presentation of essentially great purposes lends intensity to her narrative. Succeeding as she does in impressing us strongly with her convictions, there is nothing of dogmatism in their preaching. But the suggestiveness of every chapter is backed by pictures of real life."--_New York World._
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY, BOSTON.
PRISONERS OF POVERTY.
WOMEN WAGE-WORKERS: THEIR TRADES AND THEIR LIVES.
BY HELEN CAMPBELL,
AUTHOR OF "THE WHAT-TO-DO CLUB," "MRS. HERNDON"S INCOME," "MISS MELINDA"S OPPORTUNITY," ETC.
The author writes earnestly and warmly, but without prejudice, and her volume is an eloquent plea for the amelioration of the evils with which she deals. In the present importance into which the labor question generally has loomed, this volume is a timely and valuable contribution to its literature, and merits wide reading and careful thought.--_Sat.u.r.day Evening Gazette._
She has given us a most effective picture of the condition of New York working-women, because she has brought to the study of the subject not only great care but uncommon apt.i.tude. She has made a close personal investigation, extending apparently over a long time; she has had the penetration to search many queer and dark corners which are not often thought of by similar explorers; and we suspect that, unlike too many philanthropists, she has the faculty of winning confidence and extracting the truth. She is sympathetic, but not a sentimentalist; she appreciates exactness in facts and figures; she can see both sides of a question, and she has abundant common sense.--_New York Tribune._
Helen Campbell"s "Prisoners of Poverty" is a striking example of the trite phrase that "truth is stranger than fiction." It is a series of pictures of the lives of women wage-workers in New York, based on the minutest personal inquiry and observation. No work of fiction has ever presented more startling pictures, and, indeed, if they occurred in a novel would at once be stamped as a figment of the brain....
Altogether, Mrs. Campbell"s book is a notable contribution to the labor literature of the day, and will undoubtedly enlist sympathy for the cause of the oppressed working-women whose stories do their own pleading.--_Springfield Union._
It is good to see a new book by Helen Campbell. She has written several for the cause of working-women, and now comes her latest and best work, called "Prisoners of Poverty," on women wage-workers and their lives. It is compiled from a series of papers written for the Sunday edition of a New York paper. The author is well qualified to write on these topics, having personally investigated the horrible situation of a vast army of working-women in New York,--a reflection of the same conditions that exist in all large cities.
It is glad tidings to hear that at last a voice is raised for the woman side of these great labor questions that are seething below the surface calm of society. And it is well that one so eloquent and sympathetic as Helen Campbell has spoken in behalf of the victims and against the horrors, the injustices, and the crimes that have forced them into conditions of living--if it can be called living--that are worse than death. It is painful to read of these terrors that exist so near our doors, but none the less necessary, for no person of mind or heart can thrust this knowledge aside. It is the first step towards a solution of the labor complications, some of which have a.s.sumed foul shapes and colossal proportions, through ignorance, weakness, and wickedness.--_Hartford Times._
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY, BOSTON.