English crime writer, journalist, novelist, screenwriter, and playwright. He wrote 175 novels, 24 plays, and numerous articles. In the 1920s, one of Wallace’s publishers claimed that a quarter of all books read in England were written by him. He was known during his lifetime for the J. G. Reeder detective stories, „"The Four Just Men"”, „"The Ringer"”, and for creating the Green Archer character. He is most famous today as the co-creator of King Kong. „"A King by Night"” is...
Set in the late 1920s-early 1930s, „When the Gangs Came to London” is rated as one of Edgar Wallace’s best work by fans of his genre of crime fiction. Two rival gangs from Chicago coming to London and competing to blackmail rich men into paying up to prevent being killed. When a lull ensues, Captain Jiggs Allermain of the Chicago Detective Bureau suspects the rival gangs of forming an uneasy alliance. Suddenly a shot rings through the House of Commons, unleashing an outburs...
Clay Shelton is an outstanding forger and has been capable of cheating on an entire country. One day is finally arrested, convicted of the assassination for killing a policeman and sentenced to death. His execution is performed and the case is closed. Or this is what everyone thinks, until the judge who sentenced Shelton, his prosecutor and executioner are brutally murdered by „the Terrible People”, an mysterious secret organization. The next name on their list is the one o...
Alva Collins, the mentally unbalanced wife of airline pilot Evan Collins, wants her husband to leave his job. She is neurotic, vicious and unstable but only her brother knows that she is a hopeless psychopath whose condition can only deteriorate. However, she is tragically killed when someone throws a hive of bees into her bedroom. Police deduce that whoever was responsible knew that Alva was allergic to the insects, and suspicion immediately falls on her husband. This earl...
Novelist, playwright and journalist, Edgar Wallace, is best known for his popular detective and suspense stories which, in his lifetime, earned him the title, „King of the Modern Thriller. This early work by Edgar Wallace was originally published in 1934. „The Woman From the East and Other Stories” is an enjoyable collection of short stories that include „The Chopham Affair”, „The Hopper”, „The Silver Charm”, and many more. As the stories are rather short and quite fast-pac...
A murder is committed among the rich of a small town, and with more than one ghost and all the evidence seems to point to a beautiful young woman... „The Valley of Ghosts”, written as one of four detective novels in 1922, is set in the seemingly peaceful community Beverly Green, a place where upper-middle-class families live a secluded life. Why was Stella Nelson with the victim in the middle of the night, shortly before the murder? Who was the mysterious blackmailer who he...
The second of Edgar Wallace’s two short story collections about Scottish airman Tam during World War I. In this book Tam is joined by a new young American protégé Billy Best. The stories of Tam the pilot are not mysteries. They are the entertaining stories of the exploits of a cockney aviator who supposedly was Charles Lindbergh’s childhood inspiration to fly. Tam is a real person, and all the adventures set forth have actually happened, though names and places are necessar...
This Edgar Wallace mystery takes place in London. Hope Joyner, ward of a Mr. Hallet whom she has never met, is in love with Sir Richard Hallowell. Diana Montague, who was once engaged to Sir Richard, now keeps very dubious company – Sir Richard’s brother Graham for one. He has just been released from prison. Since Graham has been away Diana has acquired money, and she is now Press Secretary for the Prince of Kishlastan, who according to Colly Warrington, is totally besotted...
Inspector Tillizinni is back, this time involved in the quest to locate an ancient tomb of the Great Emperor – the first Emperor of the Chinese, who died two centuries before the birth of Christ and its world-changing secret. The Society of Joyful Intention – the most bloodthirsty organization the world has known. It concerns Tillizinni also, for Scotland Yard placed him on his mettle, set him a challenging task, which threatened at one time to bring ruin to the greatest de...
A dangerous gang of criminals is imprisoned after a daring robbery, although the ringleader who masterminded the crime disappears with the loot. Finally released after ten years behind bars, they are out for vengeance on the man who betrayed them, and the trail leads to a lonely house haunted by organ music and the specter of a hooded figure who prowls its dark corridors. But the police are on their tail also wanting to find out who was behind the robbery. Another breathtak...
„The Fourth Plague” is an intriguing crime novel that was published in 1913, during the early years of Wallace’s career as a novelist. Here again pits a master detective against a powerful crime syndicate, this time with an Italian background. An Italian secret society, burglary, kidnapping, detectives, mysterious artefacts, remarkable coincidences! This is a tale of the Red-Hand, a criminal organization that makes Count Festini, its secret head, the most dangerous man in E...
Ambrose Sault finds a quasi-scientific way to insert his soul into another man’s body before he is hanged for murder. The murder of Moropulos by Sault is a mystery in motive and deed. Twice a murderer, Sault is nevertheless a commanding figure and an appealing character. He is the center of a tragedy... The novel is long and breezy and a bit confusing, a comedy of manners at some points, a melodrama at others. This story from the most prolific writers of the twentieth centu...
Conventional ideas of beauty are typically associate it with goodness and kindness. However, appearances can be deceptive. A classic mystery crime novel involving the evil deeds of one Jean Briggerland, a woman with all the outward angelic qualities imaginable but possessing an unspeakable evil nature, so lovely that none can see her guilt – even in connection with the most blatant crimes! Jean uses her criminal connection to climb to the heights of wealth and power, but la...
Various people had tried, and failed, to break the strong will of Diana Ford. Her lawyers, for instance, thought they could dissuade her from coming to England. Her cousin, Gordon Salisbury, found she had moved in as a permanent houseguest, uninvited and defiant of convention. So, it was not surprising that when she suspected Gordon of being the victim of a clever impersonation, Diana should take charge. Recommended for Edgar Wallace fans and fans of old-time, classic crime...
Several employees on a nobleman’s estate show up at a former abbey, reputed to be haunted, to search for a hidden treasure. However, a mysterious hooded figure begins killing off those who may have figured out where the treasure is hidden. Who the Black Abbott is, what his purpose is – and how he is connected with the mystery of the treasure – these are the elements of the story. There’s a malevolent ghost, buried treasure, the elixir of life, a crooked lawyer, a tangled ro...
Fashionable Londoner James Morlake is a gentleman with many secrets and several particularly valuable skills – like terrorizing bankers across the city. His Moorish servant Mahmet has some secrets to hide as well, particularly when his employer gives him the odd task to perform in the dead of night in dark London. A collection of short stories from Edgar Wallace featuring a private detective who tracks down blackmailers. When you do reach the end you will anxiously await a ...
Gdy w krótkim czasie do Scotland Yardu wpływają dwie sprawy morderstwa, Sir John, szef instytucji, jest zaskoczony. Pomiędzy ofiarami nie widać żadnego związku, a jednak trudno przyjąć, że makabryczna seria to tylko zbieg okoliczności. Śledztwo wszczynają inspektor Dick Martin i jego asystent Holmes. Sprawa nabiera tempa, gdy bandyta Pheeny wyjawia im, że dostał niedawno osobliwe zlecenie od nieznanego klienta: wyłamać drzwi z siedmioma zamkami. W 1962 roku powieść została ze...
Klasyczna i jedna z najbardziej popularnych powieści kryminalnych Edgara Wallace’a, sfilmowana w 1959 roku. Po londyńskich ulicach tułają się ludzie z wytatuowaną na przedramieniu żabą. To członkowie legalnej organizacji Bractwo Wielkiej Żaby zrzeszającej włóczęgów. Choć jej działalność jest sformalizowana, nikt - łącznie z uczestnikami - nie zna jej struktur ani przywódców. Inspektor Elk i prokurator Gordon mają podejrzenia, których postarają się dowieść - ich zdaniem Bractw...
W ponurym domu nad rzeką doszło do tajemniczego zabójstwa. Zamożny właściciel budynku został zamordowany starym, afrykańskim mieczem, a w kieszeni ofiary znaleziono klucz od pokoju, w którym... ktoś uwięził jego sekretarkę. Czy trop prowadzący policję do dawnych zdarzeń z Afryki jest właściwy? Czy detektyw Minter o przydomku ,,Super" rozwiąże zagadkę zbrodni i złapie sprytnego przestępcę? ,,Tajemnica Samotnego Domu" to zbiór zawierający mini powieść i trzy krótkie, bardzo wci...
Emil Louba od lat wodzi na zatracenie mieszkańców Malty. W prowadzonym przez niego domu publicznym niejeden już zostawił majątek, stracił twarz lub wplątał się w szemrane interesy. Nieprawy biznesmen ma wielu wrogów, którzy coraz mocniej domagają się, by opuścił miasto. Należy do nich kapitan Hurley Brown, dowodzący miejscową jednostką wojskową. Gdy jeden z jego podopiecznych, młody obiecujący oficer, popełnia samobójstwo tuż po rozmowie z Loubą, konflikt między żołnierzami a...
"Mixer" (The Mixer) to ten, który się wtrąca, ten który przeszkadza. Nasz bohater Mixer „przeszkadza” szczególnie oszustom, złodziejom, różnorakiej maści naciągaczom i krętaczom. Za pomocą rozmaitych forteli próbuje ich wywieść w pole i okraść. Czy uda mu się to za każdym razem? Polecamy serdecznie powieść Człowiek o stu obliczach. Polecamy również Twarz o zmroku, Tajemnica szpilki i inne powieści w cyklu Klasyka angielskiego kryminału. Edgar Wallace (1875–1932...
Nieoczywista fabuła, zaskakujące zwroty akcji czy zmyślne intrygi – oto, dlaczego ta kryminalna powieść drogi trzyma w napięciu od pierwszej do ostatniej strony.Pewnego dnia w na pozór spokojnym miasteczku Creith dochodzi do morderstwa. Jego zagadkę postanawia rozwikłać detektyw Wellington. Daje to początek serii nieoczekiwanych zdarzeń, które szybko przenoszą się z Londynu początku dwudziestego wieku do egzotycznego Tangeru.
Zbiór urokliwych dwunastu opowiadań, których wspólnym mianownikiem, a zarazem bohaterem jest tytułowy Orator, czyli Mówca. Jego przezwisko nie wzięło się jednak bynajmniej stąd, że wiele mówił... Mówca więcej milczał i tym właśnie doprowadzał przestępców do załamania psychicznego. A jego ksywa to po prostu kombinacja inicjału imienia oraz nazwiska: O. Rater. W przytoczonych historiach Mówca zmierzy się z najprzebieglejszymi przestępcami Londynu lat 20. To jeden z lepszych tom...