IT IS impossible to say anything out of the ordinary about this book. That is a confession which ought to damn it from the start. In reviewing so many of these profound studies of adolescence it has become irksome to repeat the only catch words which can be repeated--realism, frankness, and so on. It has finally dawned upon me that the story of a man's emotional strivings and strugglings are bound to be all these things. They make good reading but do not last, for any other true story, confession, or what you will, has the same appeal.

This study, then, lacks that breadth and temperance which made Willard Huntington Wright's "The Man of Promise" worth a second printing. It is too hysterical for repetition. Sincerity is the only positive element which stands forth as a distinctive mark of the author. The adventures of Lewis are true to form, the duality of imagination and action is developed along the usual lines. The title, and the use of the obelisk as a symbol, have only a tenuous bond with the solid flesh of the story. The sincerity of the narration and the freedom from sophisticated or psychological patter are the bright points.

There is a compelling desire to give a word of fatherly warning to the author and publishers, italics, screaming type, and other forced means of drawing attraction to the passionate and sublime moments in the prose, have already been used by the tabloids. It's nothing new.