“I’d tasted blood, and it was all over with me. Why should I work when I could steal? Why settle down to some humdrum uncongenial billet, when excitement, romance, danger and a decent living were all going begging together” – A. J. Raffles, The Ides of March.

Ernest William Hornung (June 7, 1866 – March 22, 1921) was an English author. Hornung was the third son of John Peter Hornung, a Hungarian, and was born in Middlesbrough. He was educated at Uppingham during some of the later years of its great headmaster, Edward Thring. He spent most of his life in England and France, but in 1884 left for Australia and stayed for two years where he working as a tutor at Mossgiel station. Although his Australian experience had been so short, it coloured most of his literary work from A Bride from the Bush published in 1899, to Old Offenders and a few Old Scores, which appeared after his death...

Raffles, Further Adventures of the Amateur Cracksman (also published as The Black Mask) is the second collection of stories in the Raffles series. After the dark turn of events at the end of The Gift of the Emperor, Bunny’s done his time and, his life not being quite what it was before, now finds himself longing for the companionship of his Raffles.

Rachel Minchin stands in the dock, accused of murdering the dissolute husband she was preparing to leave. The trial is sensational, and public opinion vehemently and almost universally against her. When the jury astonishes and outrages the world with a vedict of Not Guilty, Rachel quickly finds herself in need of protection. It comes in the form of a surprising offer of marriage from a mysterious stranger who has sat through every day of her trial. The marriage to this intriguing stranger, Mr. Steel, is by mutual agreement to be a platonic one, the only condition of which is that neither is ever to question the other about the past...

Gentleman thief A.J. Raffles burgles his way through a series of homes in late Victorian England. A Thief in the Night is a short story collection and Hornung's third book in the Raffles series.

A. J. Raffles is a British gentleman thief of some renown who, in this, the hero's final adventure, ironically demonstrates a sense of morality by teaching a London East End loan shark a lesson. The book was later made into a movie, as well as a British television series.

Containing many realistic details based on Childers’ own sailing trips along the German North Sea coast, the book is the retelling of a yachting expedition in the early 20th century combined with an adventurous spy story. It was one of the early invasion novels which predicted war with Germany and called for British preparedness. The plot involves the uncovering of secret German preparations for an invasion of the United Kingdom. It is often called the first modern spy novel, although others are as well, it was certainly very influential in the genre and for its time...

Dot and the Kangaroo, written in 1899, is a children’s book by Ethel C. Pedley about a little girl named Dot who gets lost in the Australian outback and is eventually befriended by a kangaroo and several other marsupials.

This is the story of seven incorrigible children living near Sydney in the 1880’s with their military-man father, and a stepmother who is scarcely older than the oldest child of the family. A favourite amongst generations of children for over a century, this story tells of the cheeky exploits of Meg, Pip, Judy, Bunty, Nell, Baby, and The General (who is the real baby of the family), as well as providing a fascinating insight into Australian family life in a bygone era.

A six year-old girl named Mary spends Christmas vacation with her parents in the Arizona desert of 1901 or thereabouts.

The Mysteries of Paris (French: Les Mystères de Paris) is a novel by Eugène Sue which was published serially in Journal des débats from June 19, 1842 until October 15, 1843. Les Mystères de Paris singlehandedly increased the circulation of Journal des débats. There has been lots of talk on the origins of the French novel of the 19th century: Stendhal, Balzac, Dumas, Gautier, Sand or Hugo. One often forgets Eugène Sue. Still, The Mysteries of Paris occupies a unique space in the birth of this...

The Gold Sickle; or, Hena the Virgin of the Isle of Sen. A Tale of Druid Gaul is the first part of Eugène Sue's The Mysteries of the People; or, History of a Proletarian Family Across the Ages, in which he intended to produce a comprehensive "universal history," dating from the beginning of the present era down to his own days. Sue's own socialist leanings made this history that of the "successive struggles of the successively ruled with the successively ruling classes". In the first volume we meet the Gallic chief Joel, whose descendants will typify the oppressed throughout the suite of novels...

Into the home of an interesting but self-centered family in old France comes Paula, a young orphaned cousin, from the little village of Villar, in the Waldensian Valley. Though living very simply, tending cows, goats, sheep and rabbits, Paula has been brought up to know and love the Lord Jesus and read the Scriptures. Her Lord and His Word are the center of her life, and she can no more keep this good news all to herself than she can stop breathing or eating. This causes a good many complications, for her cousins' home was one where "religion" was a forbidden subject, never to be mentioned, and Paula soon found herself forbidden to read her own precious Bible...

What happens when a not-so-lucky man happens upon a brass bottle and releases the djinni caught within? Misunderstanding, culture shock, hilarity, among other things. Will the well-intentioned djinni help his new master? Or will he make things even worse?

Set in Victorian times, the novel concerns business man Paul Bultitude and his son Dick. Dick is about to leave home for a boarding school which is ruled by the cane wielding headmaster Dr. Grimstone. Bultitude, seeing his son's fear of going to the school, foolishly says that schooldays are the best years of a boy's life, and how he wished that he was the one so doing. At this point, thanks to a handy magic stone brought by an uncle from India which grants the possessor one wish, they are now on even terms...

Another delightful example of an English writer poking fun at his countrymen, or maybe all races' reactions to someone from a diferent background. A series of adventures of a well educated foreigner in London which originally appeared weekly in Punch, sometimes with illustrations, dealing with the difficulties of fully understanding a different culture. The hero's perfect English reminds one of a quote from "My Fair Lady" ..."His English is too good, he said, "that clearly indicates that he is Foreign. Whereas other people are instructed in their native language English people aren't."