TRAVELLER FROM A SMALL KINGDOM

by Emily Cheney Neville ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 13, 1968

Emily was skinny, blond, blue-eyed and erratic."" No dissimulation-it's the author digging an underground castle with one cousin or warring with all the available cousins or hiding from the new governess with elder sister Mary. But Mrs. Goodall flushes them out immediately-she is the one governess whose scalp would not be taken. She exacts punctuality and obedience (even, cannily, from Mother), extols British products and remedies, and exudes energy; after exploring the small kingdom inhabited by Cheneys and their dependents, she leads the girls forth into town for shopping or to the pond for skating-and outside Emily is the object of a curiosity that is sometimes hostile. Mostly life is bounded by Cheney customs and vague parental benevolence. Emily goes bankrupt in the egg business, neglects a recalcitrant pet goat, learns, dimly, about menstruation. Then Mrs. Goodall leaves, Emily and Mary go to school with children who aren't Cheneys, Mother takes sick and dies a week later, the Depression comes...and the small kingdom falls into perspective as a place to remember. Which is what Mrs. Neville is doing, with unself-conscious acuity, and if her memoir lacks the conflict-climax propulsion of fiction it does skip along with an easy balance of satisfactions and regrets and a final welcome to the world.

Pub Date: March 13, 1968

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Harper & Row

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1968

Categories: FICTION