Some Honeymoon!

by Charles Everett Hall, Robert Gaston Herbert (Illustrator)

Grey embossed boards with grey and orange letters and graphics. FIRST EDITION. "A farce comedy of high order and one sure to be talked about.'' DJ is price clipped and has a half inch chip at the top of the spine. There are nine tears to one inch. 280 pages.

Hardcover

Published January 1, 1918

Reviews

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

An implausible but still enjoyable romantic comedy. It would have filmed well, especially during the era of the Hays Code, because it's completely clean. The hero even thinks with satisfaction, when he first kisses his new wife, that he's glad he has lived a clean life and has no regrets caused by previous relationships.

Here's the first implausible bit, which comes right at the start, so it doesn't need spoiler tags. John Ryder is a hard-driving 35-year-old businessman who has made a lot of money by being hard-nosed and unsentimental, and has "never looked twice at a woman". But the moment he gets on the ship to return from a vacation in England to his native New York, and bumps into Miss Mont, who is emigrating to the US in the hope of going on the stage, he falls instantly in love with her. By the time they get to New York, he has proposed (as was the style at the time - this is from 1918).

The next bit needs spoiler tags, because although I worked it out before Ryder did, it does drive the plot for a good while before it gets revealed. When they get to New York, there are two cases of mistaken identity. A woman who turns out to be Miss Mont's long-lost sister (their family was scattered when the parents died) is waiting for a man on the same boat, John B. White, and when Ryder mistakes this Miss Mont (Ruth) for the other Miss Mont (Rose), she also, implausibly, mistakes this John (Ryder) for the other John (White), and agrees to marry him. White and she had known each other some years before, and had been corresponding, and he was keen to marry but she wasn't, until she saw Ryder - who is not a handsome man - and the two instantly loved one another.

They go straight from the docks and get married ASAP, and then go to a hotel for their honeymoon. Then the trials start. The bridge which is the only road access to the hotel is broken, and causes the bus to break down. The manager of the hotel is in a fight with the owner, and has decided to close the hotel out of spite and throw all the people out, even though there's nowhere for them to go and it's cold. Ryder organizes things - coal, lamps, oil, candles; electricity is provided by the hotel's own coal-fired dynamos - which keeps him from his new bride. So does a hysterical widow in the hotel, who has a breakdown and has to be looked after by the bride. Meanwhile, a Mr. John B. White has turned up, and seems to know the new Mrs. Ryder, though she says not; and notes between Ryder and his wife keep going astray for some reason. She's under the impression that she's Mrs. White, and, having implausibly mistaken Ryder for White at the docks, doesn't seem to recognize the actual White at all. Cue suspicion and misunderstanding, all while Ryder clashes with some and becomes a hero to others of the people at the hotel, and incurs the suspicion of the (female) house detective.

It's all amusingly farcical, though more for us than poor John Ryder, who hasn't had a chance to be alone with his new wife.

It all eventually gets sorted out when White heads back to New York, and Ryder's wife disappears, and, thinking she's gone with White, Ryder goes back to confront either or both of them, finds the original Miss Mont that he met on the boat, finds out there are actually two of them and that the one he loves is (fortunately) the one he married, tracks her down and talks it all through with her.

The main premise doesn't make a lick of sense, but the whole thing is in every other way emotionally sound, and it's no worse than a lot of musical comedies or modern rom-coms, so... fun and amusing, and I recommend it.

[Regina Thompson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Boy is this dated and the ending is ridiculous!!