¶See Wolff 127. Grant Allen, 1848-1899, was a Canadian novelist and science writer who was a staunch supporter of evolution throughout the latter part of the nineteenth century. Allen started writing fiction in the mid 1880s and his novels include works of early science fiction as well as 'new women' novels, of which this is the most notorious - going through nineteen editions in a year; it is the story of an independent, unmarried woman having a child.