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The Steward

Edgar Wallace

This early work by Edgar Wallace was originally published in 1932. Wallace was an extremely prolific writer who wrote over 175 novels, plus numerous plays, essays and journalistic articles. During the peak of his success during the 1920s, it was said that a quarter of all books read in England were written by him. In England, in the 1920s, Wallace was said to be the second biggest seller after the Bible. Many of his novels were made into films and TV dramas. The Steward is a collection of short stories that include The left Pass, The Little Baroness, Solo and the Lady, and many more. The stories are fast-paced with some surprising twists, well written and great to read and definitely a product of their time and place.

The Stoat

Lynn Brock

We meet a man named Margesson, who suffers from a mentally ill wife and two harmful children. Unfortunately, Margesson will soon not only die, but also his offspring. Traveling to Ireland the author was Irish plays a decisive role in understanding the strange sequence of events that are deeply rooted in the past. The darkness of Brocks books is more fashionable these days than when they were written, but his sometimes dense, sometimes elliptical style confronts him.

The Strange Boarders of Palace Crescent

E. Phillips Oppenheim

Mr. Roger Ferrison has just returned to London after several years of living rough in Canada. He takes a small room in the boarding house run by Mrs. Dewar. There he meets the bewitching invalid Fiona Quayne who rapidly develops a consuming passion for Ferrison. Meanwhile, back at the Boarding House, Colonel Dennett is murdered. One suspects from the very beginning that not all of the boarders at Mrs. Dewars establishment in Palace Crescent are what they appear to be, and Mr. Oppenheim does not attempt to hide for long the existence of some secret and probably criminal bond between Mrs. Dewar and some of her boarders. The sensational theft of a Jewelry collection, missing Indian rubies, and the lackadaisical intervention of Scotland Yard all contribute to the plot.

The Strange Countess

Edgar Wallace

This genuine mystery story takes the reader from one exciting adventure to another with all the adroitness and ingenuity of Mr. Wallaces previous successful books. One is left gasping with suspense as the many clues are unraveled only to be followed by others still more stubborn. A beautiful woman has spent twenty cruel years in prison, for a suspected murder. Her daughter learns of the relationship after a chance visit at the jail. The true facts are known only after the discovery of nefarious plots to kill the daughter, visits to the home of royalty, and enforced stays at a so-called home for mental cases. This early work by Edgar Wallace was originally published in 1925. The Strange Countess is a mystery novel by this prolific author of detective fiction.

The Strange Lapses of Larry Loman

Edgar Wallace

Larry Loman is a member of the Criminal Investigation Department of New Scotland Yard. While on a special assignment in Asia he contracts a form of malaria that causes him to suffer character-changing bouts of amnesia for up to eight hours at a stretch. When Larry is assigned to deal with the Crime Trust, a syndicate which has gathered just about every crook in England into one organization, his periodic blackouts result in all sorts of unforeseen complications. However, he eventually breaks the Trust, and his disease goes into remission. The Strange Lapses of Larry Loman is an enjoyable mystery short story by Edgar Wallace with some surprising twists, well written and great to read.

The Strangers Gate

E. Phillips Oppenheim

This is a mystery novel surrounding German intrigue and bauxite mining in typical Oppenheim style. E. Phillips Oppenheim was the self-styled prince of storytellers and composed some one hundred and fifty novels, mainly of the suspense and international intrigue nature, but including romances, comedies, and parables of everyday life. In this one, Beverley, a handsome tycoon, operates an unknown bauxite mine in mythical kingdom of Orlac, and wages a battle of wits against German secret agents and the extravagant king when another mine is discovered. Beverley sides with a pauper Prince, on whose property the metal is found, and with his sister.

The Stretelli Case and Other Mystery Stories

Edgar Wallace

This early work by Edgar Wallace was originally published in 1930. The Stretelli Case and Other Mystery Stories is a collection of short stories, some also published in other collections of Wallaces works. This volume includes: Code No. 2, Red Beard, The Man Who Killed Himself, The Mediaeval Mind, and many more. This is a nice collection of eleven short stories loosely classified as mysteries; while thriller elements are certainly present in most of them, the stories, with one exception, are indeed mysteries of one sort or another. Several stories feature detectives per se; most of them have people under pressure who must decipher baffling situations in order to correct deformations in the social structure.

The Substitute Millionaire

Hulbert Footner

A multimillionaire Silas Gyde was killed by an anarchists bomb and Jack Norman found himself Silas Gydes sole heir and the richest man in New York. The inheritance included a warning from his benefactor about an elaborate protection scheme promising to protect the wealthy from anarchists, in which Gyde had declined to enroll. Jack enlists a out-of-work actor to take on his own identity, while he, in the guise of Jack Normans secretary, works furiously behind the scenes to break up the gang and unmask their leader Mr. B.