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The Secret Places of the Heart was written at a time when Wells was obsessed with the teaching of history and it is, in his own words, 'saturated with the historical idea'. It was also written at a time when he was heavily overworked. He had completed the immense task of writing The Outline of History and was simultaneously at work on The Salvaging of Civilisation, a series of lectures planned for delivery in the United States, and A Short History of the World. The Secret Places of the Heart bears all the signs of having been prepared during a phase when Wells was tired and ill, and despite much interesting dialogue it is one of his least successful discussion novels.