What follows is Arnold Bennett's glowing review of Frank Harris's first novel, The Bomb.
It is eight years since the appearance of "Montes the Matador," a volume which contains one of the finest short stories ever written by Saxon, Russian, or Gaul. Mr. Frank Harris has at last thought fit to publish another book. I know not what he has done with himself in the meantime, but whatever his activity has been, I resent it, as it was not literary. "The Bomb" bears all the external marks of a publication by Messrs. Methuen. The name of Mr. John Long, however, is on the title-page. One may assert with confidence that "The Bomb " is the most serious work of imagination yet issued by the publisher-in-ordinary to Mr. Nat Gould and Mr. Hubert Wales. I congratulate him. I wonder how many dilettanti of literature have preserved through eight years their enthusiasm for the author of "Montes the Matador" and "Elder Conklin." I wonder how many of them, when they saw the name of Frank Harris among "To-Day's Publications" in their newspaper, took instant and eager measures to procure his book. Not that for a moment I imagine "Montes the Matador" to have had a large sale. I am convinced that it was too true, sober, unsentimental, and distinguished to have had a large sale. But its contents were immensely and favourably talked about by people whose good opinion helps an author's works to sell among the sheep, and if "The Bomb" had appeared seven years ago it would have been sure of success. I shall watch with interest the remarks upon it of the mandarins. "A really great book," said Dr. Robertson Nicoll the other day, writing not, strange to say, of Mr. Clement Shorter's mausoleum for the Bront
