Bridie Steen
by . Scribner, $3.00.
Anne Crone’s first novel is set in an Irish border county, where Catholics and Protestants are “two kinds of people” between whom flows “a river of darkness.” Opening with Bridie’s childhood in the home of poor foster parents, who reared her as a Catholic, the story carries her into the impressive household of her Protestant grandmother. There Bridie falls in love with a Protestant and is caught between immense pressures to “turn “ and an allegiance, deep as instinct, to her faith. Miss Crone’s achievements are several; the characterization of Bridie, wonderfully delicate and vital: the memorable lesser portraits; the vivid landscape, with its bogs and lakes and whitewashed farmhouses; the impartial eloquence with which the theme of religions bigotry and the resulting tragedy are handled. Bridie Steen is hardly, as Lord Dunsany says, “one of the great novels of our time”; thoroughly old-fashioned in flavor, it harks back to the Hardy tradition. But it is. unquestionably, a fine, beautifully written book.