The Penguin Book of Gaslight Crime

Great fun. Some really amusing stories, a few less so, many with a surprisingly modern sensibility. ( )

Sims has done an amazing job assembling these stories of criminal capers from the gaslight era (love the cover, with the gloved gent's hand in the act of swiping the Penguin logo). The introductions are informative, inspiring and invaluable.

Fascinating to see this vein of fiction that arose in response to the glittering wealth of the Gilded Age (many of the rich people in these stories are Americans). But Victorian charm isn't quite enough to sustain the collection. And it may have been a bit much to have 4 stories with "Diamonds" in the title.

Standout stories by: Grant Allen, Guy Boothby, Arnold Bennett, O. Henry (of course), Sinclair Lewis (!), and Edgar Wallace - but that's half the collection, with no stinkers. A pretty good average. ( )

Overall an enjoyable collection to while away a few days with on the bus. Michael Sims has assembled an interesting group of con men, thieves and rogues who would have been contemporaries of Sherlock Holmes. Each story is by a different author and comes with an introduction by Sims explaining why he included the story and putting it in context with the author's other works. I really appreciated these introductions, as well as the notes for further reading.

Of the stories themselves, my favourite was probably the Sinclair Lewis story "The Willow Walk", which was a fascinating character study. I also liked Edgar Wallace's "Four Square Jane" and nearly laughed out loud at the conclusion of "The Episode of the Diamond Links." I also nearly laughed out loud at William Le Queux's contribution, "The Story of a Secret", but that could be because I find him funny in and of himself. The story was pretty good though. It was also interesting to finally read a story about Raffles ("Nine Points of the Law"), but the introduction made me grumpy because Sims compared Raffles and his partner/biographer Bunny to Holmes and Watson, with Bunny and Watson being "dim-witted". Watson is not dim-witted; Holmes is just so smart he blows everyone else out of the water! But that was a minor gripe and did not affect my enjoyment of the story itself.

Since these are short stories and many rely on clever twists at the end, I can't really say too much about them. Most have a breezy feel to them, even as their protagonists merrily rob their way to financial security. Basically, if you like the stories of Sherlock Holmes, you'll probably like this collection. The cover is great, too. Very nicely done. ( )

The advanced uncorrected proof contains four more stories (with a sticker on the cover saying they will not appear in the finished version of the book):
H.G. Wells - The Hammerpond Park Burglary
"Clifford Ashdown" R. Austin Freeman & John James Pitcairn - The Foreign Office Despatch
Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin in Prison
R. Austin Freeman - The Brazen Serpent ( )

Besides having the most amusing cover of almost any book I've ever owned, The Penguin Book of Gaslight Crime is a fantastic little collection of late Victorian crime stories. The editor, Michael Sims, deserves credit for a wonderful collection that doesn't include a single dud. Every story in this book was enjoyable and a few were unforgettable.

Though we are all fairly familiar with a famous Victorian detective or two, Sims decided, after working on a collection of stories about the famed gentleman thief Arséne Lupin, that the era's thieves weren't getting the attention they deserved. After reading this collection, I heartily agree.

I hadn't read any of the authors in this volume except for O. Henry and his classic Christmas heartstring-puller "The Gift of the Magi" -- which couldn't be more different from his tale of frontier town trickery, "The Chair of Philanthromathematics". I also read Sinclair Lewis for the first time in this book with his creepy "The Willow Walk".

http://webereading.com/2011/10/rip-read-3-penguin-book-of-gaslight.html ( )