By Arthur Conan Doyle.

It is impossible to read and weigh the facts in connection with the conviction of Oscar Slater in May, 1909, at the High Court in Edinburgh, without feeling deeply dissatisfied with the proceedings, and morally certain that justice was not done. Under the circumstances of Scotch law I am not clear how far any remedy exists, but it will, in my opinion, be a serious scandal if the man be allowed upon such evidence to spend his life in a convict prison. The verdict which led to his condemnation to death, was given by a jury of fifteen, who voted: Nine for "Guilty," five for "Non-proven," and one for "Not Guilty." Under English law, this division of opinion would naturally have given cause for a new trial.

New York: Hodder & Stoughton, George H. Doran, 1912. 102p.

By William Johnston and Paul West.

In every detail so far this day was a duplicate of almost every previous day in Josiah Hopkins' life since he had first come to Gray don as instructor in chemistry. But the deadly sameness ceased then and there, marking the eighteenth of May as a day long to be remembered in the history of the little college.

Toronto: McLeod & Allen, 1910. 344p.

By Alan Pinkerton.

I desire to again call attention to the fact that the stories herein contained, as in the case of their predecessors in the series, are literally true. The incidents in these cases have all actually occurred as related, and there are now living many witnesses to corroborate my statements. Maroney, the expressman, is living in Georgia, having been released during the war. Mrs. Maroney is also alive. Anyone desiring to convince himself of the absolute truthfulness of this narrative can do so by examining the court records in Montgomery, Ala., where Maroney was convicted. The facts stated in the second volume are well known to many residents of Chicago. Young Bright was in the best society during his stay at the Clifton House, and many of his friends will remember him. His father is now largely interested in business in New York, Chicago, and St. Louis. The events connected with the abduction of " The Two Sisters," will be readily recalled by W. L. Church, Esq., of Chicago, and others. The story of " Alexander Gay," the Frenchman, will be found in 2047318 6 PREFA CE. the criminal records of St. Louis, where he was sentenced for forgery.

New York: G. W. Dillingham Co., 1903. 256p.

By Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

A timeless story of love and violence, the rationalized triumph of passion over reason, of self deception over care, envy and hatred of authority and class, and of course, much, much more in this dense novel.

NY. Parkway Printing (1886) 600p.

By Robert Louis Stevenson.

Set in the backdrop later Victorian London, this book can be told as belonging to the category of science fiction, psychological thriller and suspense thriller. Dr Jekyll, a famous and notable scientist seems to be somehow linked with Mr Hyde, a most-wanted criminal. Mr Utterson, a good renown lawyer of the period as well as Jekyll's good friend, tries connecting the dots to find out the truth, a most-shocking truth.

London: Longmans, Green, 1886. 141p.

By Victor Hugo.

Testimony of an eyewitness. History of a Crime is a novel based on actual events surrounding the assumption of power of Napoleon III following the 1848 revolution. Hugo's narrative takes in the four days during which Napoleon enacted a coup d'etat through which he assumed the Presidency and concludes with an exposition of the Franco-German War in 1970 which resulted in Napoleon's downfall. The narrative is written from the perspective of Hugo himself who was briefly involved in the before exiling himself to Belgium and thence to the Chanel Islands and while the novel is clearly dramatized, it does well to invoke the drama of the times and provides a sense of the times on behind the barricades.

NY. Harrow and Heston Classic Reprint. (1877) 515 pages.

By David Balfour .

Being memoirs of the adventures of David Balfour in the year 1751, written by himself and now set forth. “Set in 1751, the flight of David Balfour and Alan Breck across the Highlands of Scotland is based on real events. Though he wrote the book to make money, while living as an invalid in Bournemouth. Stevenson was proud of it; he inscribed a presentation copy with the couplet. Here is the one sound page of all my writing. The one I'm proud of and that I delight in. Rowland Hilder is famous for his paintings of the English countryside but his work in book illustration covered a much wider canvas…. His drawing for Kidnapped were first published in 1930 and have undeservedly, been long out of print. A sixteen-year-old orphan is kidnapped by his villainous uncle, but later escapes and becomes involved in the struggle of the Scottish highlanders against English rule. “

New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1886. 324p.

By Benjamin P. Eldridge and William B. Watts.

A Faithful Portrayal of the Conflict Between the Criminals of This Age and the Defenders of Society, the Police. “AS we sit in our office chairs, our rival, the rascal, leers down at us through a thousand masks. He is reckless, gay, demure, stolid, dogged, sullen, surly, threatening, desperate. He has the smirk of the confidence man, the furtive glance of the sneak thief, the scowl of the burglar, the menace of the murderer. The moulds of every vice and crime which the world knows are ranged before us in a single group of pictures -- the photographs which compose the Rogues' Gallery. Our rival, the rascal, was born before the beginning of history. He has existed ever since knavery sought to outwit honesty and villainy attacked by force or fraud the natural right of man to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. In the earliest conditions of society the honest man fought the rascal singlehanded Or with the chance help of his neighbors. With the advance of civilization, came the institution of the standing safeguards of watchmen and constables, culminating at length in the great disciplined forces of our city police. From the farthest stretch of tradition down to the present hour society has been fighting our rival, the rascal, day and night, with all its accumulating powers of defence and suppression, and yet the rascal has not been subdued and for ages to come he will doubtless continue to defy the law and infest the earth. Still the advancing experience, organization and deter- mination arrayed against him have succeeded, at least, in making his path in life a painful tramp over rocks and thorns with traps and pitfalls threatening his feet at every step. Between him and the grand organization of the defenders of society, simply summed up in the term, the police, there is an undying rivalry and an incessant contest, the one striving by every hook and crook to blind the eyes or escape the clutch of the other which in turn is constantly spurred on to meet craft with craft and foil every new shift of resourceful villainy by redoubled alertness in detection and capture. In the following pages we have designed to show the rascal of to-day in his multiform bodies and faces. We have distinguished, as sharply, and vividly as we can, the varying types in our Rogues' Gallery. We have depicted the bunco man, the sneak thief, the burglar, the forger—the trickster and ruffian of every known stripe. We have shown what conditions make or mould them, how they plan, how they work, what covers they seek, and how the police in turn plan and work to forestall, deter, detect and capture them.”

Boston, MA: Pemberton Pub. Co, 1897. 433p.

By Arthur B. Reeve..

The early exploits of Craig Kennedy, scientific detective. Contents: Craig Kennedy's theories.--The silent bullet.--The scientific cracksman.--The bacteriological detective.--The deadly tube.--The seismograph adventure.--The diamond maker.--The azure ring.--"Spontaneous combustion."--The terror in the air.--The black hand.--The artificial paradise.--The steel doorNew York: Harper and Brothers, 1910. 390p.

By Arthur Conan Doyle..

13 Sherlock Holmes stories, originally published in 1903-1904. The first story is set in 1894 and has Holmes returning in London and explaining the period from 1891–1894, a period called "The Great Hiatus" by Sherlockian enthusiasts. Also of note is Watson's statement in the last story of the cycle that Holmes has retired, and forbids him to publish any more stories. (Description from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The stories: The Empty House. The Norwood Builder. The Landing Men. The Solitary Cyclist.. The Priory School. Black Peter. Charles Augustus Milverton. Six Napoleons. Three Students. Golden Since-Nez. Missing Three-Quarter. The Abbey Grange. The Second Stain

NY. Harrow and Heston Classic Reprint. .(1903-1904) 289 pages.

By Freeman Wills Crofts.

When a cask breaks open in a busy London shipping yard, the discovery of its contents leads to a puzzling case for Inspector Burnley of Scotland Yard. As the Inspector begins to trace the mysterious movements of the cask, his investigative procedures bring him to Paris and onto the path of a meticulously plotted murder, one step at a time.

New York: Thomas Seltzer, 1924. 342p.

By Chester K. Steele.

Being a Somewhat Different Detective Story. The Diamond Cross Mystery is an excellent detective novel for adults published by the Stratemeyer Syndicate under the pseudonym Chester K. Steele – one out of the many pen-names used by the producer. The story starts with a murder – a woman is found dead in her own jewelry shop. Her cousin, Mr. Darcy is suspected to have committed the murder, but the first and most obvious suspect is always innocent in good murder mysteries, so the suspect’s fiancée hires the American version of Inspector Clouseau, Colonel Lee Ashley to carry out an investigation of his own. Though everything continues to point to Darcy, the Colonel eventually reveals the identity of the murderer, but not before lots of suspense, unexpected twists and some amazing action. The murder is surrounded by some very strange circumstances – the cause of death is difficult to identify and all the clocks in the shop stop at different times, to mention just two of the puzzles to be ingeniously solved. The detective’s private interests are also involved in the investigation – it is Ashley’s his passion for fishing will help him solve the case eventually.

New York: George Sully & Co., 1918. 331p.

By Mary E. Hanshew and Thomas W. Hanshew.

“…every moment that passes! I am terribly afraid for Father's life, even as I have told Mr. Narkom here. But there are some things which a woman cannot tell. Those things which she feels in her heart--and has no concrete facts with which to explain them. Father will die if you do not come to my rescue immediately. He will die, and by no natural means. I tell you, my father is being poisoned slowly, and because of his very taciturnity none of us can save him! Even now, as I sit here, something tells me that things are not right with him, or with Ross, my brother! All my life long I have had these premonitions. There must be gipsy blood in me, I think. But there it is. Oh, help me to save him, to save my brother Ross's inheritance. And my blessing will go with you to the end of your days!"

Garden City, NY: A.L. Burt, 1922. 328p.

By. A.A. Milne.

This is probably one of the top classics of "golden age" detective fiction. Anyone who's read any mystery novels at all will be familiar with the tropes -- an English country house in the first half of the twentieth century, a locked room, a dead body, an amateur sleuth, a helpful sidekick, and all the rest. It's a clever story, ingenious enough in its way, and an iconic example of Agatha Christie / Dorothy Sayers -type murder mysteries. If you've read more than a few of those kinds of books, you might find this one a little predictable, but it's fun despite that. It's particularly of note, however, because Raymond Chandler wrote about it extensively in his essay "The Simple Art of Murder." After praising it as "an agreeable book, light, amusing in the Punch style, written with a deceptive smoothness that is not as easy as it looks," he proceeds to take it sharply to task for its essential lack of realism. This book -- which Chandler admired to an extent -- was what he saw as the iconic example of what was wrong with the detective fiction of his day, and to which novels like "The Big Sleep" or "The Long Goodbye", with their hard-boiled, hard-hitting gumshoes and gritty realism, were a direct response.

New York: E.P. Dutton, 1922. 277p.

By Freeman Wills Crofts.

When a mutilated body is found beside a railway tunnel in Groote Park the tragedy appears a straightforward case of accidental death, but Middeldorp police Detective-Inspector Vandam senses foul play. Vandam begins an investigation into the dead man, Albert Smith, which takes the case from the wilds of South Africa to mountains and glens of Scotland, where a near-identical crime has been perpetrated…

Toronto: T.Allen, 1929. 301p.

By Freeman Wills Crofts.

It seemed an innocent enough puzzle at first, a truck with one number plate when first seen, but another when seen a few hours later. But Seymour Merriman and his friend, Claud Hilliard, soon become convinced that the Pit- Prop Syndicate is a front for some sort of illegal activity. They just can't figure out the what or how. But when one of the members of the syndicate is found murdered in a taxi, it becomes a matter for the professional detectives of Scotland Yard who must solve the secret of The Pit-Prop Syndicate! (From Amazon).

London: W. Collins Sons, 1922. 309p.

By Agatha Christie.

Pretty, young Anne Beddingfeld has come to London looking for adventure. But adventure finds her when a strange-smelling man falls off an Underground platform and is electrocuted on the rails. The police verdict is accidental death. But who was the man in the brown suit who examined the body before running away? Armed with only one cryptic clue, Anne is determined to track him down and bring the mysterious killer to justice.

New York: William Morrow, 1924. 239p.

By Christopher Morley.

A Mysterious Story. This is a dramatic novel set in Brooklyn around the end of the First World War. It continues the story of Roger Mifflin, the bookstore of Parnassus on Wheels. It also subtly embodies the career of Miss Titania Chapman and a young salesman named Aubrey Gilbert. "The Haunted Bookstore" is certainly not an extraordinary novel. Perhaps the name implies the phantom of the past that often appears in all libraries and bookstores: "The phantom of all incredible writing." Throughout the novel, Molly mentions the personality of Roger Mifflin The information and acuity that people can get from writing. The story begins with the young salesman Aubrey Gilbert (Aubrey Gilbert), who stopped in front of a bookstore called "The Haunted Bookstore", hoping to find another customer. Gilbert met the boss Roger Mifflin. Gilbert does not have the upper hand in selling and promoting copies. (From Amazon).

Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Page and Co., 1923/ 296p.

By Melville Davisson Post.

Top-notch detective Sir Henry Marquis, head of the Criminal Investigation Department of Scotland Yard, and several of his clever proteges band together to crack a number of fascinating cases in this collection of interwoven tales. Can you outwit the famed Sleuth of St. James's Square?

New York ; London : D. Appleton and Company. 1920. 350p.

By E. Phillips Oppenheim.

“There were very few people upon Platform Number Twenty-one of Liverpool Street Station at a quarter to nine on the evening of April 2 - possibly because the platform in question is one of the most remote and least used in the great terminus.”

Boston: Little, Brown, 1920. 332p