Never Ask the End

Marta and Pauline are two American women traveling in Europe in the 1930s. The meet up with Marta's old friend Russ in Paris and follow him to Antwerp, and then go on to London without him. All of them reminisce about their lives up to this point when their various adventures dredge up old memories. Marta is separated and Pauline is widowed, and both have their eyes on Russ, but Russ's health is failing and it isn't clear if he isn't picking up on their hints or isn't interested.


Isabel Paterson is remembered as one of the three founding mothers of the libertarian movement, along with Ayn Rand and Rose Wilder Lane. In her own day, however, Paterson was feted primarily as a literary critic and a novelist. Her book reviews in the New York Herald Tribune — signed "I.M.P." — commanded praise and fear for 25 years. Her nine novels  were the legacy that literary friends and associates believed Paterson would pass onward. Instead, The God of the Machine became Paterson's best-known work by far. This sweeping exploration of philosophy, history, and economics has cemented her image as a political figure. But unlike Rand, whom she mentored, Paterson did not write explicitly political novels. Moral and political themes surface, but they decidedly take second place to the development of character and the expression of style.


The Laissez Faire Books publication of Never Ask the End —  Paterson's most commercially successful novel — is an important step toward restoring an appreciation of Isabel Paterson the novelist. The removal of her contributions from literary history was an act of political theft for which restitution is now being rendered.


In a review of Never Ask the End, the left-libertarian philosopher Roderick T. Long wrote, "What's important is that Paterson was a good novelist, one whose work deserves to be rescued from obscurity. Never Ask the End, the gracious and haunting semi-autobiographical story of the entangled fates of three American expatriates in interwar Europe, is one of her best. I hope this republication helps to rekindle interest in this marvelous and unjustly neglected author."