_Famous Ghost Stories_, edited by _J. Walker McSpadden_ (The Thomas Y. Crowell Company). This selection follows more conventional lines than that of Mr. French, which I spoke of above, but it contains Defoe’s “True Relation of the Apparition of One Mrs. Veal,” which is perhaps the best ghost story ever written, and which has the advantage of relative unfamiliarity. The other thirteen stories are by Sir Walter Scott, Mrs. Gaskell, Bulwer-Lytton, H. B. Marryat, Fitz-James O’Brien, Hawthorne, Irving, Poe, Kipling, and Dickens. The publisher should be congratulated on the best piece of bookmaking of the year. _E. K. Means_ (G. P. Putnam’s Sons). This book is so good that it needs no title, but raises the question as to what its successor will be called. It is a series of negro farces in narrative form chronicling the joys and tribulations of Vinegar Atts, Figger Bush, Pap Curtain, Hitch Diamond and other Louisiana negroes. The town of Tickfall will have its pilgrims some day if this book finds the audience it so richly deserves. _Shandygaff_, by _Christopher Morley_ (Doubleday, Page & Co.). Mr. Morley says that this book contains short stories and I will leave to the reader the delightful task of hunting them. Meanwhile I beg the question and step aside after introducing the reader to good discourse on many subjects by a man who knows how to talk. _Uncle Abner_, by _Melville Davisson Post_ (D. Appleton and Company). Few writers have so conscientious a technique as Mr. Post, or such a fine sense of plot. This collection of mystery stories is woven around the personality of Uncle Abner, whose Greek sense of justice is inflexible. All of these stories are masterly examples of the justifiable surprise ending, yet have the logic and dramatic power which we have come to associate with Athenian tragedy. Their effectiveness is largely due to the value of under statement. _Sketches in Duneland_, by _Earl H. Reed_ (John Lane Company). These studies of the dune country of Lake Michigan fall into two groups. The second and larger group consists of character studies drawn from the quaint denizens of this district with skilful humor and fine characterization. “Holy Zeke,” “The Love Affair of Happy Cal,” and “The Resurrection of Bill Saunders” are the best stories in this collection, though the whole is very good indeed. _Miss Mink’s Soldier_, by _Alice Hegan Rice_ (Century Company). This is a pleasant collection of Mrs. Rice’s better short stories. They will give quiet pleasure to the reader who is not too exacting and show a wide range of human interest.