Quite True by Dora Russell

Quite True was published weekly in the Bolton Weekly Journal from March 1880 to August 1880 and received varied reviews from critics at that time. The series has been said to have elements of murder and death. It is apparent from reading, that Quite True is consistent with the rest of Russell’s series’. The Examiner regarded the third volume of the novel to be “de trop”  – undesirable or unwelcome (1881, p.89) – while the first and second volumes are enough to grasp the novel’s plot and conclusion. In the same review, Russell is praised for her novel as the book comes across as “very readable” (p.89).  

Although The Examiner review of Russell’s novel is short, it is direct and straight to the point. This critic uses the words “not wanted” or “unwelcome” in relation to Dora’s third volume. Tellingly, the reviewer allows more space for plot summary than sustained critique of the novel (as was often the case in nineteenth-century reviews); if this critic felt rightly about Russell’s novel, they would surely have more criticism to offer. The critic does not leave much room for praise on Russell’s novel, though, and only describes the characters and the plot of the novel as “desperate” and “hardly correct” (p.89). 

Alternately, The Athenaeum’s review of the novel is evidently different. A review that also examines Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Just as I Am (1880), which was likewise serialised in the Bolton Weekly Journal, the section dedicated to Russell’s serialised novel is longer and the tone of the review is more upbeat. Quite True is regarded as “well woven, and in some of its incidents highly sensational” (1880, pp.496-497). The Athenaeum praises Russell for writing in “an unobjectionable manner” (p.497) while “describing human relations which a more fastidious or prudish writer might see fit to avoid” (p.497). The essay further declares that it cannot be “a very easy thing to blow one’s own trumpet” (p.496) and yet describes the protagonist of Russell’s novel as doing just that, notably managing to “please one’s listeners” (p.496). The continuation of Russell’s serialised fiction worked in her favour, despite the other not-so-good reviews. The critic of The Athenaeum is much more applauding of Russell’s talent and sufficiency in writing, as “like Miss Braddon, the author has had plenty of practice” (p.497). 

You can read an interesting overview of Russell’s life, provided by Troy J. Bassett’s At the Circulating Library, here.