futile" hybrid race. Florida land boom Three of Roberts's first books were written at least in part to promote the Florida land boom of the 1920s. They were Sun Hunting (1922), Florida Loafing (1925), and Florida (1926). Many people lost a lot of money in the bust that followed. These books were usually omitted from the lists of “other books by this author” published in the front pages of his later works. Dowsing In the 1940s, Roberts became acquainted with Henry Gross, a retired Maine game warden and amateur water dowser. He and Gross began a long association to use Gross's claimed dowsing abilities to find deposits of water, petroleum, uranium, and diamonds, through a corporation named Water Unlimited, Inc. Roberts documented his experiences in three nonfiction books that were popular successes but received much criticism from the scientific community. He joked that he should have given The Seventh Sense the subtitle Or How to Lose Friends and Alienate People.Maine cooking When Roberts was working on Trending Into Maine, he published a chapter in the Saturday Evening Post which was dedicated to dishes he remembered having as a boy growing up in Maine. Several months after the chapter was published he began to receive mail from residents and ex-residents who were troubled that he neglected to mention many of the dishes they knew and loved from the Pine Tree State. Roberts was distressed by the letters but decided to keep them, and they were eventually compiled by his secretary, Marjorie Mosser, and eventually included in the cookbook Good Maine Food, which was first published in 1939. Roberts wrote the introduction to the book and a chapter on diet. BooksEurope's Morning After (1921), a collection of Saturday Evening Post essaysWhy Europe Leaves Home (1922), a collection of Saturday Evening Post essays on immigrationSun Hunting: Adventures and Observations among the Native and Migratory Tribes of Florida (1922), humorous essays, Florida promotionBlack Magic (1924), a collection of Saturday Evening Post essaysConcentrated New England: A Sketch of Calvin Coolidge (1924), an informal biographyFlorida Loafing (1925), humorous essays, Florida promotionFlorida (1926), Florida promotionArundel (1929), a historical novelThe Lively Lady (1931), a historical novel (see Dartmoor Prison)Rabble in Arms (1933), a historical novelCaptain Caution (1934), a historical novelFor Authors Only, and Other Gloomy Essays (1935), humorous essaysIt Must Be Your Tonsils (1936), humorous essaysNorthwest Passage (1937), a historical novelMarch to Quebec (1938), a historical compilationTrending into