Book excerpt: He was cursed, it seemed, with a fatal fascination. Women might be practically engaged to other men; they might be at the altar's hinges; but he could not stroll among them with his devilish gift without scattering ruin amid the troths. If he was not openly rude to them, they took it as direct encouragement; if he was civil, from him they viewed it as wooing; and when actually crowned with the deliberate kiss...-from Angela's BusinessWould he be seduced by the ultrafeminine wiles of old-fashioned Angela Flower? Or would writer and oh-so modern man Charles King Garrott come to recognize the charms of independent-minded schoolteacher Mary Wing? This 1915 novel, a bestseller in its day, wrings drama and ironic humor from the social upheaval of the early 20th century, as women began to assert the personhood and enjoy their autonomy... and men barely knew what to make of it.Author Henry Sydnor Harrison was a rarity in his time-a vocal male feminist-and this perceptive work is an excellent example of his fictional championing of a very real character: the New Woman of the new century.American author HENRY SYDNOR HARRISON (1880-1930) is best remembered for his novels Queed (1911) and Captivating Mary Carstairs (1914).