At the Actors' Boarding House, and Other Stories

New York: Brentano's. Very Good. 1907. Second Edition. Hardcover. (pictorial cloth; no dust jacket) [sound copy, minor wear to extremities, spine cloth a bit faded, slight dust-soiling to top edge, front cover illustration partially rubbed away (but there's a different illustration on the rear cover, exhibiting little or no rubbing), unique vintage bookplate (Milt & Claire Castle) on front pastedown]. Twenty-seven amusing anecdotal short stories, many (but not all) concerning the denizens of the Maison de Shine boarding house, which catered to theatrical folk and other such lowlifes. With titles like "The Fickleness of Pugnose Grady's Girl," "The Poker Game in the Pullman Smoker," and "Flatnose Ed Takes His Medicine," most are just four or five pages in length, and had their origins as part of the author's popular newspaper feature in the New York Morning Telegraph. One contemporary critic declared that "nowhere in current fiction is to be found a more accurate record of colloquial English as it is rendered by a goodly proportion of the rising American generation." Another such compilation of Ms. Green's stories, "The Maison de Shine; More Stories of the Actors' Boarding House," was published the following year. .