A Rogue's Luck
{{Short description|1909 novel by Arthur Wright}}
{{Infobox book|
| name = A Rogue's Luck
| title_orig =
| translator =
| image =
| caption =
| author = Arthur Wright
| illustrator = J. Muir Auld
| cover_artist =
| country = Australia
| language = English
| series = Bookstall series
| genre = sporting
| publisher = NSW Bookstall Company
| release_date = 1909
| english_release_date =
| media_type =
| pages = 229
| isbn =
| preceded_by =
| followed_by =
}}
A Rogue's Luck is a 1909 novel by Australian author Arthur Wright. It originated as a 1907 short story.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article126267709 |title=A ROGUE'S LUCK. |newspaper=The Sunday Times |location=Sydney |date=3 November 1907 |accessdate=27 September 2014 |page=1 Section: The Sunday Times MAGAZINE SECTION |publisher=National Library of Australia}}
Plot
Sydney clerk Kendall Curtis disappears on the day of his marriage to Vera with a sum of money belonging to his employer, the firm of Hardgoods, Hopkins and Co. His general manager, Horace Wakefield, persuades Vera to marry him instead.
It turns out that Wakefield is leading a double life as a bookie, Doods Dodson. And that Wakefield had arranged for Curtis to be robbed on the way to the ceremony, drugged with chloroform, and dumped on a boat to Melbourne.
Wakefield/Doods then kills Vera's father. Vera and Curtis are reunited in Melbourne where Wakefield then kills a detective.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article50376462 |title=LITERATURE. |newspaper=The Examiner |location=Launceston, Tas. |date=20 July 1909 |accessdate=27 September 2014 |page=8 Edition: DAILY |publisher=National Library of Australia}}{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article37585330 |title="A ROGUE'S LUCK.". |newspaper=Western Mail |location=Perth |date=21 August 1909 |accessdate=27 September 2014 |page=50 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}
Reception
The Sydney Morning Herald said the book "rejoices in a silver king, a missing bridegroom, a murder, a boxing school, and various other essential properties for a first class romance, and has the additional advantage of a local setting."{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article15108122 |title=RECENT FICTION. |newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald |date=17 July 1909 |accessdate=27 September 2014 |page=4 |publisher=National Library of Australia}} The West Australian called it:
melodrama in the highest. The material is there, but terribly heavy call are made on the reader's credulity... It is all furiously improbable, but there is something about it of the interest that attaches to melodrama and charms the gallery, and while the story is in progress one for gets to impose the foot-rule of rigid experience and probability. The author has real good dramatic instinct. His incidents in themselves are well told. It is in composition that he is weak. The individual incidents could probably happen, but they could hardly happen in the way represented. At any rate Mr. Wright has imagination (albeit it wants discipline). His villains are good notable villains, and his favourites are good likeable people.
References
{{reflist}}
External links
- [http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article126267709 Original 1907 short story]
- [http://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/C193559 A Rogue's Luck] at AustLit
- [http://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/DetailsReports/ItemDetail.aspx?Barcode=3398277&isAv=N Rogue's Luck] at National Archives of Australia
- [http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/result?q=%22Rogue%27s%20Luck%22%20%22Arthur%20Wright%22 Newspaper articles on book] at Trove
{{Arthur Wright}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rogue's Luck}}
Category:1909 Australian novels