The novel presents a discussion of the philosophy of love and sex, written in the form of a series of letters between two men, "Herbert Wace," a young scientist, and "Dane Kempton," an elderly poet. Writer Jack London wrote "Wace's" letters, and Anna Strunsky wrote "Kempton's." In the late 19th century, the authors were part of a San Francisco radical literary group known as "The Crowd."

Kempton makes the case for feeling and emotion, while Wace proceeds "scientifically" and analyzes love in Darwinian terms:

"I purpose to order my affairs in a rational manner....Wherefore I marry Hester Stebbins. I am not impelled by the archaic sex madness of the beast, nor by the obsolescent romance madness of later-day man. I contract a tie which reason tells me is based upon health and sanity and compatibility. My intellect shall delight in that tie."

Initially the public was piqued by the anonymity of the writers and the book was moderately successful. London biographer Russ Kingman praised the book; he quoted the Buffalo Commercial as admiring the "sheer charm of its prose" and saying the book "holds firmly its place in the front rank of the best of the season's publications."

The Mutiny of the Elsinore is a novel by the American writer Jack London first published in 1914. After death of the captain, the crew of a ship split between the two senior surviving mates. During the conflict, the narrator develops as a strong character, rather as in The Sea-Wolf. It also includes some strong right views which were part of London's complex world-view. The novel is partially based on London's voyage around Cape Horn on the Dirigo in 1912.

The character "De Casseres," who espouses nihilistic viewpoints similar to the ideas of French philosopher Jules de Gaultier, is based on London's real-life friend and journalist Benjamin De Casseres.

The People of the Abyss (1903) is a book by Jack London about life in the East End of London in 1902. He wrote this first-hand account after living in the East End (including the Whitechapel District) for several weeks, sometimes staying in workhouses or sleeping on the streets. In his attempt to understand the working-class of this deprived area of London the author stayed as a lodger with a poor family. The conditions he experienced and wrote about were the same as those endured by an estimated 500,000 of the contemporary London poor. London also used the expression "the people of the abyss" in his later dystopian novel The Iron Heel (1907).

A classic non-fiction work which describes the struggle for survival by the working class during Jack London's day and age.