["The Green Years"] is not one of Dr. Cronin's more effective novels. To get right down to the truth, it is rather a weak and tentative effort, lacking both the assurance and the dramatic outline which are generally characteristic of his work. Some of this lack of tone is certainly the result of design rather than accident, since the story is simply an account of a boy's growth from eight to eighteen. Such a tale would be expected to ramble, to unwind like a kitestring rather than to expand from any dramatic center. Yet even here, in the history of a youth, some position must be taken by the writer other than that of friendly narrator. He may take a youth's view of life, give it to us through eyes drowned in new sight, ears and nostrils assailed with the wonderful, agonizing freshness of sensation. Or he may...