Biggest new item at the Yorba Linda library this week was a book by a young woman who spent most of her childhood and youth in Yorba Linda, and still has many ties here.

The book is "The Friendly Persuasion," published by ancient and honored Harcourt, Brace. The author signs herself Jessamyn West, though her legal name is Mrs. Max MacFarland, now living in Napa. She is the elder daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Eldo West, now of East Whittier. For years Mr. West was superintendent of the Yorba Linda Water Company and he and Mrs. West were leading figures in the Yorba Linda Meeting of the Friends church. Mrs. MacFarland was not only the daughter of active Friends, but the granddaughter on both sides of her house of Friends ministers. And her stories deal almost exclusively with the ways of thought and the ways of living of Friends. The book now in the Yorba Linda Library is made up of short stories she has written which have appeared in the magazines most rigidly exacting in the literary excellence of the stories they print.

Another book many Yorba Lindans will be eager to read is "The Human Life of Jesus," by John Erskine, professor in the English department of Columbia University. Many readers remember Prof Erskine best by his first widely known book, "The Private Life of Helen of Troy." Dr. Erskine's Helen is rather witty but not an altogether sanctimonious character, and his later books have hardly led us to expect of him an attempt at a "life" of Jesus -- for which no material exists in the world as now known. Doctor Erskine is no mystic and sticks pretty closely to naturalistic phenomena in his latest subject. For instance, he says the Twelve were so impressed with the transcendent personality of Jesus that they finally came to believe that he rose from the dead. It's like that all the way through, but not to be overlooked if you are eager for anything looking like a scrap of information about the life of Jesus.

Besides the expected flood of westerns and who dun-its there is "The Black Rose," a novel by Thomas B. Costain, about which reviewers know nothing beyond the fact that it is selling to beat the band --C.M.V.

Here it the full list selected this week by Mrs. Ellen Cochran, librarian.

Adult Books

Sons of the Wilderness; life of John Muir, by Linnie Marsh Wolfe.

This Is Where I Came In, by Robert J. Casey.

This Man Truman, by Frank McNaughton and Walter Hehmeyer.

Nine Mile Bridge, three years in the Maine Woods, by Helen Hamlin.

The Human Life of Jesus, by John Erskine.

Tomorrow's House, by George Nelson.

Marta of Muscovy; the fabulous life of Russia's first Empress, by Phil Stong.

Black Moon, by Clark McMeekin.

Heritage of the River; an historical novel of early Montreal, by Muriel Elwood.

The Friendly Persuasion, by Jessamyn West.

Roger Sudden, by Thomas H. Raddall.

The White Tower, by James Ransey Ullman.