While the plot ofThe Barrierapproaches the melodrama, and the sensitive reader is shocked by the brutal use of the English language, the vividness of the descriptions carries him bodily into the wilds of Alaska, and when the book is closed he feels as if he himself had shot roaring rapids, had been tortured by mosquitoes, and had looked down the threatening barrel of a Colt's .44. The story is of an Arctic enchantress, who captivates Lieutenant Burrell of the United States Army."

The Net begins: The train from Palermo was late. Already long, shadowy fingers were reaching down the valleys across which the railroad track meandered. Far to the left, out of an opalescent sea, rose the fairy-like Lipari Islands, and in the farthest distance Stromboli lifted its smoking cone above the horizon. On the landward side of the train, as it reeled and squealed along its tortuous course, were gray and gold Sicilian villages perched high against the hills or drowsing among fields of artichoke and sumac and prickly pear. See other titles by this author available from Kessinger...

Rex Ellingwood Beach (1877 - 1949) was an American novelist, playwright, and Olympic water polo player. His second novel The Spoilers (1906) was based on a true story of corrupt government officials stealing gold mines from prospectors, which he witnessed while he was prospecting in Nome, Alaska. The Spoilers became one of the best selling novels of 1906. His adventure novels, influenced by Jack London, were immensely popular throughout the early 1900s. Beach was lionized as the "Victor Hugo of the North, ." In this book: The Iron Trail The Barrier Heart of the Sunset