SOURCE: Walton, Eda Lou. “Honesty and Fiction.” Nation 138, no. 3577 (24 January 1934): 107.

In the following review, Walton observes that Passions Spin the Plot straddles the categories of fiction and autobiography, loosing “dramatic power” as a result. Walton asserts the novel is otherwise interesting, and honest, and that the central character is developed with depth and complexity.

This second novel [Passions Spin the Plot] in Mr. Fisher's tetralogy, which began with In Tragic Life, continues the story of Vridar Hunter through his college years. Both books are rather like case histories, both seem to be rather thinly disguised autobiography, and as autobiography they are very interesting and quite powerful. Mr. Fisher tells us that his purpose above all others is to write an “honest” book, and this he has done. His ability to describe a strange and primitive country like the Antelope Hill territory, and to interpret the effect of such...