Judith Peyton lived a quiet life, working as a researcher for writers and speech-makers in Manhattan, and commuting back to her family home, inherited from her deceased grandmother and mother, in Great Neck, Long Island. Engaged for some time to her sedate high school sweetheart John Storey, a teacher and novelist caring for his invalid mother, her life had an even pattern. Into this seeming peace came brash Michael Brant, a crime writer for whom she had previously done some research, and who imperiously decided that they would get to know one another better. To complicate matters further, Judith's long absent father, who had left the family when she was five, wrote to plead with her to take in her half-sister Celise. Facing upheaval in both her family and romantic life, Judith struggled to determine just who she was: a strict no-nonsense woman like her maternal forebears, or someone more open to change and to joy, like her scapegrace father...

Published in 1938, Singing Shadows is the fourteenth book I have read from Jane (D.) Abbott, an early to mid-twentieth-century author who, in the early part of her career, wrote fiction for girls, and then later moved on to romance for adult women. Of the fourteen, this is the sixth adult title I have read, and although there were aspects of it that I enjoyed, overall I did not think it a success. I find that this author has a tendency, at least with her adult romantic fiction, to add additional plot elements that detract from the main story-line. In Angels May Weep (1937) it was the starting of the dude ranch. Here it is the whole drama with Celise, and Judith's struggle to find a way to build a relationship with her. Unlike her later work from the 1950s - River's Rim (1950), The Inheritors (1953), The Open Way (1955) - where she seems better able to reconcile her disparate plot threads, her romances from the 1930s always seem as if they are made up of parts that don't fit together that comfortably. I found myself wishing, as I read this one, that the author had either chosen to tell the story of how the Peytons came back together again as a family, or how Judith chose between John and Michael, but somehow the two stories together didn't work for me. That said, I did enjoy the setting here. Judith does her research at The New York Public Library's 42nd Street location, just like I do, and she meets Michael by the famous lion statues outside on more than one occasion. I also appreciated the discussion of divorce, which was quite dated - apparently not a good idea, but if people do separate, expecting support from the man seems to be considered an injustice - but also fascinating.

Given how obscure this title is, and how difficult to track down, I'm not sure to whom I would recommend it. I read it because I am interested in the author, but it is definitely not one of her stronger stories. Perhaps readers researching American women's romantic fiction in the late 1930s might find this one of interest. ( )