The Book Forger
- Author Joseph Hone
- Narrator Thomas Judd
- Publisher Random House
- Run Time 10 hours and 4 minutes
- Format Audio
- Genre Forgery, falsification and theft of artworks, History, Literary studies: c 1900 to c 2000, Organized crime, Publishing and book trade, Social and cultural history, Society and Social Sciences, The Arts.
Titles Purchased
- 1-5
- 6-10
- 11-15
- 16-20
- Over 20
Price p/Title
- $13.95
- $12.95
- $11.95
- $10.95
- $9.95
Listen to a sample
What to expect
Brought to you by Penguin.
London, 1932. Thomas James Wise is the toast of the literary establishment. A prominent collector and businessman, he is renowned on both sides of the Atlantic for unearthing the most stunning first editions and bringing them to market. Pompous and fearsome, with friends in high places, he is one of the most powerful men in the field of rare books.
One night, two young booksellers - one a dishevelled former communist, the other a martini-swilling fan of detective stories - stumble upon a strange discrepancy. It will lead them to suspect Wise and his books are not all they seem. Inspired by the vogue for Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes, the pair harness the latest developments in forensic analysis to crack the case, but find its extent is greater than they ever could have imagined. By the time they are done, their investigation will have rocked the book world to its core.
This is the true story of unlikely friends coming together to expose the literary crime of the century, and of a maverick bibliophile who forged not only books but an entire life, erasing his past along the way.
©2024 Joseph Hone (P)2024 Penguin Audio
Critics Review
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‘This is an absolutely fascinating literary detective story. Real-life audacious crimes uncovered by the most intrepid amateur detectives, investigated all over again a hundred years later here, in delicious forensic detail, by Joseph Hone. A must-read for anyone enthralled by the value and integrity of books. A page turner about page turners’
Janice Hallett, author of The Alperton Angels -
‘I loved this elegant untangling of a real-life literary mystery. With a cast stretching from Robert Browning to Dorothy L Sayers, it’s the perfect piece of armchair detection for any book lover’
Ruth Ware, author of The Woman in Cabin 10 -
‘A thrilling unravelling of bookish fraud that reads like a detective story from the golden age’
Roland Philipps, author of A SPY NAMED ORPHAN -
‘Criminally sophisticated skulduggery . . . A thoroughly enjoyable romp through an infamous moment in book history’
Oliver Darkshire, author of ONCE UPON A TOME -
‘Spies, detectives, forgers, and The Case of the Kernless ‘f’. Another superb piece of narrative scholarship from the best storyteller in book history’
Dennis Duncan, author of INDEX: A HISTORY OF THE
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