Spider Web

New York: Jonathan Cape and Harrison Smith. Near Fine. 1930. First Edition. Hardcover. (no dust jacket) [a nice clean copy with no significant shelfwear]. The author's very scarce debut novel, set in New York's Harlem of the 1890s, is centered around a German-Jewish widow, described in a contemporary review of the book as "a domineering, dishonest, evil-minded old woman who [has] built up a highly profitable wholesale millinery business." After taunting her 25-year-old daughter as an "old maid" for being unable to snag a husband, she then arranges a marriage for her, to a "weak little man with a sense of duty," takes him on as a salesman in her firm, and proceeds to tyrannize him as well. Many of the author's later novels feature strong-willed female protagonists, although generally speaking they're not as hideously awful as this one. A minor Lost Generation expatriate, Ms. Worthington had her own literary accomplishments somewhat unfairly overshadowed (speaking of tyrants) by her relationship with the notorious author/occultist/journalist/traveller/alcoholic/nutso William Seabrook, to whom she was married from 1935 to 1941. (She ultimately wrote a book about him, "The Strange World of Willie Seabrook," twenty years after he committed suicide in 1945.) .