The practical, everyday world seems a very sordid thing to one who follows the story of this dreamer of dreams, who from nursery make-believes and childish day dreams passes into a youth of ideals and is left in his early manhood still a visionary but with many dreams come true. With a skilful touch Don is put before us; misunderstood by a commonplace father, an acknowledged failure at a practical college course, a failure in New York where he tries to make a living as a super at a second class theatre or at anything else, he suddenly blossoms into a recognized genius as a writer of plays. And through years of struggle, from earliest childhood, his love for Margaret, his ideal, burns like a white flame, and in return she loves him, marries him and makes him happy, altho like the rest of the world, she may not always understand him.
“All the earlier part of the book is shadowy, and hardly prepares us for the vivid, admirable picture of life in New York that comes later.”
+ – Acad. 71: 527. N. 24, ’06. 190w.
“It is a book of fine fibre in purpose and execution, romantic, touching, amusing.”
+ Nation. 83: 333. O. 18, ’06. 460w.
“‘Don-a-dreams’ is his first novel, but Mr. O’Higgins has made no mistake in his new departure.” Otis Notman.
+ N. Y. Times. 11: 623. O. 6, ’06. 550w.
“It is all very tenderly and charmingly told, and we like it better because our dreamer is not of those who think wallowing in the mire synonymous with ‘knowing life.’”
+ N. Y. Times. 11: 705. O. 27, ’06. 400w. + N. Y. Times. 11: 796. D. 1, ’06. 200w.