The author is a New York lawyer and has chosen his home town as the setting for his novel. The plot hinges upon a marriage in which both a man and a woman promise to ask no questions relative to their respective pasts. The compact is kept, but the husband’s jealousy is aroused, and finally it develops that “Mrs. Harrold” in her youth had eloped with a member of a circus troupe. Her father, following them to the man’s home in Austria, kills her husband, whose own father suffers imprisonment for the crime, the real murderer being shielded by his daughter. There are many complications but the book ends with the complete vindication of the silent wife.
“Had it been half as long, ‘The silence of Mrs. Harrold’ might have been twice as good.”
| + — | Ath. 1905, 1: 746. Je. 17, 260w. |
“A novel of strong and complex interest.” W. M. Payne.
| + | Dial. 38: 391. Je. 1. ‘05. 280w. |
“I am firmly inclined to believe that the new novel of intricate plot which Mr. Gardenhire has given us in ‘The silence of Mrs. Harold’ will be warmly welcomed and meet with as wide an appreciation as its merit deserves. Mr. Gardenhire possesses remarkable constructive ability. He knows how to tell a story. The author has handled this question with a dignity and justice and fine feeling that will make the book appeal strongly to women.” James MacArthur.
| + + | Harpers Weekly. 49: 131. Ja. 28, ‘05. 1340w. |
“He knows much that is behind the scenes to the general, and yet his novel lacks atmosphere. One looks on at a carefully constructed Coney Islandish reproduction of New York; one does not feel the throb of ‘the mighty heart’ of the living city. The chief defect of the book is the one most surely fatal to fiction—it is tedious. The author is fluent, ingenious, inventive; but the long and stilted conversations ‘get on to our nerves.’ Now and again we applaud, but before the last page is reached we are exceedingly weary. In short, the novel is not the work of an artist, and so fails to take the reader with it.”
| — — + | N. Y. Times. 10: 92. F. 11, ‘05. 260w. |
“It has rarely been our fate to read more prolix, tiresome, and unnatural dialogue than that in this book, while in substance and plot the story is valueless.”