Beloved clerical sleuth in roster of remarkable cases: "The Blue Cross," "The Sins of Prince Saradine," "The Sign of the Broken Sword," "The Man in the Passage," "The Perishing of the Pendragons," more.

The complete adventures of the well-loved clerical sleuth, collected in one brilliant volume. Shabby and lumbering, with a face like a Norfolk dumpling, Father Brown makes for an improbable super-sleuth. But his innocence is the secret of his success: refusing the scientific method of detection, he adopts instead an approach of simple sympathy, interpreting each crime as a work of art, and each criminal as a man no worse than himself. This complete edition brings together all of the Father Brown stories, including two not previously available in Penguin: 'The Donnington Affair', in which Chesterton rises to the challenge of solving a murder-mystery half written by someone else (Max Pemberton), and 'The Mask of Midas', which was found in Chesterton's papers after his death. It also includes an introduction and notes by Michael D. Hurley. G.K. Chesteron was born in 1874. He attended the Slade School of Art, where he appears to have suffered a nervous breakdown, before turning his hand to journalism. A prolific writer throughout his life, his best-known books include The Napoleon of Notting Hill (1904), The Man Who Knew Too Much(1922), The Man Who Was Thursday (1908) and the Father Brown stories. Chesterton converted to Roman Catholicism in 1922 and died in 1938. Michael D. Hurley is a Lecturer in English at the University of Cambridge, and a Fellow of St Catharine's College. He has written widely on English literature from the nineteenth century to the present day, with an emphasis on poetry and poetics. His book on G. K. Chesterton was published in 2011.

G. K. Chesterton’s Father Brown may seem a pleasantly doddering Roman Catholic priest, but appearances deceive. With keen observation and an unerring sense of man’s frailties–gained during his years listening to confessions–Father Brown succeeds in bringing even the most elusive criminals to justice. This definitive collection of fifteen stories, selected by the American Chesterton Society, includes such classics as “The Blue Cross,” “The Secret Garden,” and “The Paradise of Thieves.” As P. D. James writes in her Introduction, “We read the Father Brown stories for a variety pleasures, including their ingenuity, their wit and intelligence, and for the brilliance of the writing. But they provide more. Chesterton was concerned with the greatest of all problems, the vagaries of the human heart.”

Beloved clerical sleuth in roster of remarkable cases: "The Blue Cross," "The Sins of Prince Saradine," "The Sign of the Broken Sword," "The Man in the Passage," "The Perishing of the Pendragons," more.

G. K. Chesterton's fictional amateur detective, the genial Father Brown, was greeted with huge enthusiasm when he first appeared in The Story-Teller magazine in 1910. Depicted with Chesterton's characteristic elegance and wit, this unworldly but perceptive priest-sleuth soon became a major figure in the world of whodunit fiction and continues to charm readers today. This handsome hardback anthology contains 24 Father Brown short stories, including 'The Blue Cross', 'The Secret Garden', 'The Wrong Shape', and 'The Three Tools of Death', in which the unassuming Father exercises his formidable powers of intuition and analysis to solve a range of crimes. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Arcturus Classic Mysteries and Marvels series brings together thrilling short stories from classic fiction, including spine-chilling ghost stories, gripping detective fiction and cosmic horror. These hardback anthologies with foil-embossed cover designs make wonderful gifts for any classic lover.

A Father Brown Mystery taken from The Wisdom of Father Brown. This version is great way to introduce someone to G. K. Chesterton's great amateur detective.

Immortalized in these famous stories, G. K. Chesterton's endearing amateur sleuth has entertained countless generations of readers. For, as his admirers know, Father Brown's cherubic face and unworldly simplicity, his glasses and his huge umbrella, disguise a quite uncanny understanding of the criminal mind at work. This edition includes seven tales from a number of G. K. Chesterton's 'Father Brown' books.