Talk:Manslaughter

Reviews

 * The Outlook, 14 Dec 1921
 * This seems to us decidedly the best work in fiction that its author has put forth. There are few recent American stories which combine as well as this does the interest of tense situation, sound character depiction, and straightforward, direct writing. The self-willed and imperious heroine who commits the manslaughter that gives the book its title is not spared in order to make her attractive, and yet one feels that she has fine traits and feelings despite her outstanding faults. Particularly interesting is the account of her life in prison and the way in which knowledge of the poor and unfortunate brings her to a true conception of life and breaks down finally her passionate and revengeful spirit. The court scene in the book is one of the best we have ever read and is free from the blunders which too often make such themes in fiction absurd to those who know about criminal law.


 * The Bookman Recommends, Dec 1921
 * Alice Duer Miller has the gift of writing lightly and keenly of light and keen people. Her Lydia of "Manslaughter" (Dodd, Mead) is as captivating as she is hateful: not a type, surely, but a portrayal of the most stimulating as well as the most disturbing characteristics of the modern American girl of wealth. Mrs. Miller only occasionally allows her excellent sense of plot to draw her away from smart dialogue and faithful characterization. We could wish that Lydia, convicted of manslaughter and broken in prison, had not, in the end, captured her hero. She would have been even more fascinating to me had she remained a villainess instead of becoming a heroine. However, as a study of American types and as entertaining reading, there are few better stories this fall.