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What's Bred in the Bone
This is a reproduction of the original artefact. Generally these books are created from careful scans of the original. This allows us to preserve the book accurately and present it in the way the author intended. Since the original versions are generally quite old, there may occasionally be certain imperfections within these reproductions. We're happy to make these classics available again for future generations to enjoy!
222 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1891
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About the author
Grant Allen
1,190 books32 followersCharles Grant Blairfindie Allen (February 24, 1848 – October 25, 1899) was a science writer and novelist, and a successful upholder of the theory of evolution.
He was born near Kingston, Canada West (now incorporated into Ontario), the second son of Catharine Ann Grant and the Rev. Joseph Antisell Allen, a Protestant minister from Dublin, Ireland. His mother was a daughter of the fifth Baron of Longueuil. He was educated at home until, at age 13, he and his parents moved to the United States, then France and finally the United Kingdom. He was educated at King Edward's School in Birmingham and Merton College in Oxford, both in the United Kingdom. After graduation, Allen studied in France, taught at Brighton College in 1870–71 and in his mid-twenties became a professor at Queen's College, a black college in Jamaica.
Despite his religious father, Allen became an agnostic and a socialist. After leaving his professorship, in 1876 he returned to England, where he turned his talents to writing, gaining a reputation for his essays on science and for literary works. One of his early articles, 'Note-Deafness' (a description of what is now called amusia, published in 1878 in the learned journal Mind) is cited with approval in a recent book by Oliver Sacks.
His first books were on scientific subjects, and include Physiological Æsthetics (1877) and Flowers and Their Pedigrees (1886). He was first influenced by associationist psychology as it was expounded by Alexander Bain and Herbert Spencer, the latter often considered the most important individual in the transition from associationist psychology to Darwinian functionalism. In Allen's many articles on flowers and perception in insects, Darwinian arguments replaced the old Spencerian terms. On a personal level, a long friendship that started when Allen met Spencer on his return from Jamaica, also grew uneasy over the years. Allen wrote a critical and revealing biographical article on Spencer that was published after Spencer was dead.
After assisting Sir W. W. Hunter in his Gazeteer of India in the early 1880s, Allen turned his attention to fiction, and between 1884 and 1899 produced about 30 novels. In 1895, his scandalous book titled The Woman Who Did, promulgating certain startling views on marriage and kindred questions, became a bestseller. The book told the story of an independent woman who has a child out of wedlock.
In his career, Allen wrote two novels under female pseudonyms. One of these was the short novel The Type-writer Girl, which he wrote under the name Olive Pratt Rayner.
Another work, The Evolution of the Idea of God (1897), propounding a theory of religion on heterodox lines, has the disadvantage of endeavoring to explain everything by one theory. This "ghost theory" was often seen as a derivative of Herbert Spencer's theory. However, it was well known and brief references to it can be found in a review by Marcel Mauss, Durkheim's nephew, in the articles of William James and in the works of Sigmund Freud.
He was also a pioneer in science fiction, with the 1895 novel The British Barbarians. This book, published about the same time as H. G. Wells's The Time Machine, which includes a mention of Allen, also described time travel, although the plot is quite different. His short story The Thames Valley Catastrophe (published 1901 in The Strand Magazine) describes the destruction of London by a sudden and massive volcanic eruption.
Many histories of detective fiction also mention Allen as an innovator. His gentleman rogue, the illustrious Colonel Clay, is seen as a forerunner to later characters. In fact, Allen's character bears strong resemblance to Maurice Leblanc's French works about Arsène Lupin, published many years later; and both Miss Cayley's Adventures and Hilda Wade feature early female detectives.
Allen was married twi
He was born near Kingston, Canada West (now incorporated into Ontario), the second son of Catharine Ann Grant and the Rev. Joseph Antisell Allen, a Protestant minister from Dublin, Ireland. His mother was a daughter of the fifth Baron of Longueuil. He was educated at home until, at age 13, he and his parents moved to the United States, then France and finally the United Kingdom. He was educated at King Edward's School in Birmingham and Merton College in Oxford, both in the United Kingdom. After graduation, Allen studied in France, taught at Brighton College in 1870–71 and in his mid-twenties became a professor at Queen's College, a black college in Jamaica.
Despite his religious father, Allen became an agnostic and a socialist. After leaving his professorship, in 1876 he returned to England, where he turned his talents to writing, gaining a reputation for his essays on science and for literary works. One of his early articles, 'Note-Deafness' (a description of what is now called amusia, published in 1878 in the learned journal Mind) is cited with approval in a recent book by Oliver Sacks.
His first books were on scientific subjects, and include Physiological Æsthetics (1877) and Flowers and Their Pedigrees (1886). He was first influenced by associationist psychology as it was expounded by Alexander Bain and Herbert Spencer, the latter often considered the most important individual in the transition from associationist psychology to Darwinian functionalism. In Allen's many articles on flowers and perception in insects, Darwinian arguments replaced the old Spencerian terms. On a personal level, a long friendship that started when Allen met Spencer on his return from Jamaica, also grew uneasy over the years. Allen wrote a critical and revealing biographical article on Spencer that was published after Spencer was dead.
After assisting Sir W. W. Hunter in his Gazeteer of India in the early 1880s, Allen turned his attention to fiction, and between 1884 and 1899 produced about 30 novels. In 1895, his scandalous book titled The Woman Who Did, promulgating certain startling views on marriage and kindred questions, became a bestseller. The book told the story of an independent woman who has a child out of wedlock.
In his career, Allen wrote two novels under female pseudonyms. One of these was the short novel The Type-writer Girl, which he wrote under the name Olive Pratt Rayner.
Another work, The Evolution of the Idea of God (1897), propounding a theory of religion on heterodox lines, has the disadvantage of endeavoring to explain everything by one theory. This "ghost theory" was often seen as a derivative of Herbert Spencer's theory. However, it was well known and brief references to it can be found in a review by Marcel Mauss, Durkheim's nephew, in the articles of William James and in the works of Sigmund Freud.
He was also a pioneer in science fiction, with the 1895 novel The British Barbarians. This book, published about the same time as H. G. Wells's The Time Machine, which includes a mention of Allen, also described time travel, although the plot is quite different. His short story The Thames Valley Catastrophe (published 1901 in The Strand Magazine) describes the destruction of London by a sudden and massive volcanic eruption.
Many histories of detective fiction also mention Allen as an innovator. His gentleman rogue, the illustrious Colonel Clay, is seen as a forerunner to later characters. In fact, Allen's character bears strong resemblance to Maurice Leblanc's French works about Arsène Lupin, published many years later; and both Miss Cayley's Adventures and Hilda Wade feature early female detectives.
Allen was married twi
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
June 23, 2024
The book was not at all what I expected when I read the first chapters, and I admit I struggled with the prose in places as it is very much of the time in which it was written. However I never once thought of giving up on it as I found myself drawn in to the story and wanting to know how it would turn out for the characters in the end. I had not heard of Grant Allen before, this book being one in a volume of 50 books 'you must read' : I was expecting more famous authors, the classic novels everyone knows, and my first reaction was that this book was a strange one to include... but I now want to see more of this authors works and therefore the choice to include it was a good one!
August 2, 2007
Something of a potboiler, but I am a big Grant Allen fan and am patiently waiting until he comes back in vogue. He was one of the most prolific writers of his time, but few have heard of him today. A freethinker who was ahead of his time, he was something of a renaissance man.
September 22, 2011
Hmmm. Well, I am still wondering what hit me. I read this book because my English teacher friend said she was reading it, and we have shared enjoying several of the same books, so I decided to give it a try.
First of all, it is the kind of book that only readers of serious literature would touch. Set in old England, it reminded me of some of the English Lit books we read in college.
For the first 25 pages or so, I thought...."OK, I may not finish this one." Then I started to see the complexity and humor in the text. For the next 100 pages, I read steadily with no thought of stopping. Finally, I had a hard time putting it down because I HAD to know how it would end.
Not the genre of book that I would select for a steady diet, but clever, amusing and very well written. Thanks, Barb!
First of all, it is the kind of book that only readers of serious literature would touch. Set in old England, it reminded me of some of the English Lit books we read in college.
For the first 25 pages or so, I thought...."OK, I may not finish this one." Then I started to see the complexity and humor in the text. For the next 100 pages, I read steadily with no thought of stopping. Finally, I had a hard time putting it down because I HAD to know how it would end.
Not the genre of book that I would select for a steady diet, but clever, amusing and very well written. Thanks, Barb!
December 18, 2020
For a novel first published in 1890 in a series it is rollicking good mystery thriller.
While some of the views accepted by the author about woman grate they are of their time.
BOOK DESCRIPTION
Its convoluted and colorful plot turns on questions of heredity and atavism: the ancestry of the Waring twin brothers and of Elma Clifford. Elma comes on her mother's side from a line of gypsy snake dancers, and she displays a periodic urge to dance wildly with a feather boa in her bedroom. A murderous judge, multiple mistaken identities and scenes of tribal life in South Africa decorate this extraordinary novel, which is certainly a testament to Grant Allen's versatility and grasp of the popular market.
Excerpt from What's Bred in the Bone
There was something so comically alarmed in the ring of his tone - as of a naughty Schoolboy detected in a piece of mischief - that, propriety to the contrary notwithstanding, Elma couldn't for the life of her repress a smile. She looked down at the seat where the stranger pointed, and there, sure enough, coiled up in huge folds, with his glossy head in attitude to spring at her, a great banded snake lay alert and open-eyed
While some of the views accepted by the author about woman grate they are of their time.
BOOK DESCRIPTION
Its convoluted and colorful plot turns on questions of heredity and atavism: the ancestry of the Waring twin brothers and of Elma Clifford. Elma comes on her mother's side from a line of gypsy snake dancers, and she displays a periodic urge to dance wildly with a feather boa in her bedroom. A murderous judge, multiple mistaken identities and scenes of tribal life in South Africa decorate this extraordinary novel, which is certainly a testament to Grant Allen's versatility and grasp of the popular market.
Excerpt from What's Bred in the Bone
There was something so comically alarmed in the ring of his tone - as of a naughty Schoolboy detected in a piece of mischief - that, propriety to the contrary notwithstanding, Elma couldn't for the life of her repress a smile. She looked down at the seat where the stranger pointed, and there, sure enough, coiled up in huge folds, with his glossy head in attitude to spring at her, a great banded snake lay alert and open-eyed
January 24, 2021
The author, Grant Allen, was born in Canada but grew up in the US, France, and England. I was first drawn to this book, "What's Bred in the Bone" (published in 1890) by the title. A prolific Canadian Jungian psychologist, Robertson Davies, also wrote a book called "What's Bred in the Bone" (among many others) that was published in 1985, about 100 years later. It's one of my favorite books of all time. This novel is nothing like that one but I found the title coincidence intriguing.
I highly recommend this book with one caveat. It was published in 1890, the height of the Victorian era. As such, the word choices and the construction of sentences are often foreign to the reader. That's one of the things I loved about it. But then, I also love the novels of Jane Austen and Anthony Trollop. Novels written in the mid-late 19th century stand alone. If you have the patience and interest, there are many fine novels to be read in the genre. Either of the "What's Bred in the Bone" novels should provide you with an enjoyable reading experience.
I highly recommend this book with one caveat. It was published in 1890, the height of the Victorian era. As such, the word choices and the construction of sentences are often foreign to the reader. That's one of the things I loved about it. But then, I also love the novels of Jane Austen and Anthony Trollop. Novels written in the mid-late 19th century stand alone. If you have the patience and interest, there are many fine novels to be read in the genre. Either of the "What's Bred in the Bone" novels should provide you with an enjoyable reading experience.
December 8, 2022
A very good novel featuring murder, romance, a snake, and a mind-reading young Gipsy woman, written by a Canadian (born in Kingston, ON in 1848, Grant Allen was likely a British subject until Canada attained independence on July 1, 1867) author with great knowledge of 19th-century English society. It was a suspenseful novel from the start, a good seller in its day, made into a silent movie in 1916, and I highly recommend it.
September 7, 2024
By an old dead white guy, so there was some of that casual sexism and racism from the start. But it was plot driven enough and suspenseful enough that I could kind of cringe and keep reading. Then it took a HARD left and became pretty unreadable in the last 15%. If I wasn’t compulsive about finishing books, I wouldn’t have finished this one. Do not read. 👎🏼
January 13, 2023
Surprisingly readable over the century plus since its release. Mix Murder on the Orient Express, A Comedy of Errors and Crime and Punishment with a veneer of Austen, discussion of nature / nurture, preliminary feminism and spiritual symbolism and voila! What a gem!
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February 4, 2020can't read
December 19, 2021
An old-fashioned but excellent mystery tale with a nice twist. Light reading at its best.
September 25, 2022
This was surprisingly fun to read. A comedy of errors..a complicated journey and highly recommended.
August 23, 2024
excellent book written in the style of late 19th century England. Well written, easy read. I think this would have made an great movie!
July 24, 2024
Yes, it took me 5 years to read this, but it was still a fun read :)
October 28, 2019
As literature this is a preposterous pile of Victorian sentimental novel cliches, including identical twins of mysterious parentage, mistaken identity, a Bad Man and more than one Man with a Secret Past, gypsy clairvoyance and snake charming, exile to the diamond mines of South Africa, and of course lots of True Love, but it's engagingly written and the heroine has some grit. It might be good summer reading if you like old-fashioned genre fiction. There are a couple of shockingly racist bits but they go by quickly.
July 29, 2021
Not what I expected, in a great way. A good ol’ Victorian comedy of errors. Some of it was pretty dated and/or weird, like a family whose women apparently inherit some weird impulse to dance with snakes...but hey, Victorians amirite? It was a slow start, but once the story and “intrigue” (it was basically a daytime soap) began, I was hooked. It reminded me at times of Thomas Hardy’s Mayor of Casterbridge, which I loved.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews