The Project Gutenberg eBook, When Winter Comes to Main Street, by GrantMartin Overton
WHEN WINTER COMES
TO MAIN STREET
BY
GRANT OVERTON
AUTHOR OF “THE WOMEN WHO MAKE OUR NOVELS”
NEW YORK
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
COPYRIGHT, 1922,
BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
WHEN WINTER COMES TO MAIN STREET.
Press of
J. J. Little & Ives Company
New York, U. S. A.
FOR
GEORGE H. DORAN
WHO HAD THE IDEA
PREFACE
I have borrowed my title from two remarkablenovels.
If Winter Comes, by A. S. M. Hutchinson, waspublished in the autumn of 1921 by Messrs.Little, Brown & Company of Boston.
Main Street, by Sinclair Lewis, was publishedin the autumn of 1920 by Messrs. Harcourt,Brace & Company of New York.
I have not before me the precise figures of theamazing sales of these two books—each passed350,000—but I make my bow to their authorsand to their publishers and to the American public.I bow to the authors for the quality of theirwork and to the publishers and the public fortheir recognition of that quality.
These two substantial successes confirm mybelief that the American public in hundreds ofthousands relishes good reading. Without thatbelief, this book would not have been prepared;but I have prepared it with some confidence thatthose who relish good reading will be interestedin the chapters that follow.
As a former book reviewer and literary editor,as an author and, now, as one vitally concernedin book publishing, my interest in books has beenfundamentally unchanging—a wish to see morebooks read and better books to read.
From one standpoint, When Winter Comes toMain Street is frankly an advertisement; it dealswith Doran books and authors. This is a factof some relevance, however, if, as I believe, thereader shall find well-spent the time given tothese pages.
Grant Overton.
19 July 1922.
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