Frank A Munsey's "Under Fire: A Tale of New England Village Life" (novel, non-genre, juvenile, free): Preaching "good conduct" to teenagers

There is only one reason for this non-genre post - the author. He's the inventor of "pulp" magazines, & the founder of Argosy. Argosy published Edgar Rice Burroughs, Murray Leinster, & P G Wodehouse, apart from a lot of forgotten ones.

It tells the story of a small town in the US before even my great-grandfather was born, but bits of it are probably still normal life in many a small town in current India (& may be elsewhere too).

Its worst negative is: it is preachy. And it's a predictable story. Plus it's targeted at those in their mid-to-late teens. But I still loved it, for reasons I cannot quite explain! Large parts of the story are about the value of reputation - what goes into making it, & the harm caused by losing it.

Story includes a rather long description of the technical aspects of a factory making woolen cloths - spread over several chapters; most of it just went over my head (video would have worked better).

Story summary.

Three main characters, apart from a lot of others: Fred Worthington (the hero); Matthew De Vere (the villain); & Nellie Dutton (girl that is the cause of conflict between hero & villain). All in their mid-teens.

Matthew is rich & used to have his way. Fred is from a humble background & a good boy. Nellie is ambivalent & wavering, though hero will win her. And she's a minor character, all considered.

Minor incidents, some started by villain, will dent hero's reputation: drugging him & leaving him in this state at the door of Nellie's house, making her family think he's a drunkard; spreading this news through the village, making everyone thing he's a drunkard; a misunderstanding that gets him fired from his job at a store, making everyone think he's a cheat; a robbery & arson that he gets wrongly blamed for.

Reparations begin when he's at his low. And, of course, he will overcome all obstacles, win back his reputation, & get both the girl & a promising career.

Fact sheet.

First published: 1897.
Rating: A.
Download full text from Project Gutenberg, or Manybooks.
Related: Stories from 19th century.

Free fiction: 16 monthly issues of "The Argosy" magazine of Frank A Munsey at Internet Archive

Sometimes called the first "pulp" magazine in the US, it has had nearly a century long run, & still efforts are made occasionally to revive the venerable magazine. It used to include science fiction stories, among other genres.

16 issues are now available at Internet Archive, in the form of 4 packages of 4 monthly issues each. Please note the IA post titles don't always match the contents of the package; links below mention what is found inside the downloaded documents.

1. December 1897 to March 1898: 4 novels, 6 serialized stories, 14 short stories, plus a dozen poems.
2. December 1898 to March 1899: 4 novels, 7 serialized stories, 14 short stories, & over a dozen poems.
3. December 1899 to March 1900: 4 novels, 8 serialized stories, 32 short stories, 2 dozen poems.
4. April-July 1990: Posted today. 4 novels, 8 serialized stories, 48 short stories, & over a dozen poems.

Any future posts of it at IA, along with Astounding scans, will now be automatically picked up by reprints feed.

An aside: Wikipedia provides this helpful tidbit from the early days of the magazine when it was targeted at children: "Munsey found that targeting children had been a mistake, as they did not stay subscribed for any length of time, since they grew out of reading the magazine. Additionally, children did not have much money to spend, which limited the number of advertisers interested in reaching them."

Related.

1. Stories from The Argosy.
   
2. Someone has been maintaining an online database of Argosy covers.