The Lock and Key Library

by Julian Hawthorne (Editor)

Somewhere in the Other World, where there are books and pictures and plays and shop windows to look at, and thousands of men who spend their lives in building up all four, lives a gentleman who writes real stories about the real insides of people; and his name is Mr. Walter Besant. But he will insist upon treating his ghosts--he has published half a workshopful of them--with levity. He makes his ghost-seers talk familiarly, and, in some cases, flirt outrageously, with the phantoms. You may treat anything, from a Viceroy to a Vernacular Paper, with levity; but you must behave reverently toward a ghost, and particularly an Indian one.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Short Stories, Classics, Crime, Anthologies

370 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1909

About the author

Julian Hawthorne was the son of Nathaniel Hawthorne. He wrote poetry, novels, non-fiction, a series of crime novels based on the memoirs of New York's Inspector Byrnes, and edited several collections of short stories. He attended Harvard, without graduating, and later studied civil engineering.

In 1898, Julian submitted an eyewitness account of the destruction of the United States battleship, Maine off of the island of Cuba for William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal (although it has been proven that Julian was in the United States at the time of the explosion). Hawthorne's eyewitness testimony of foul play and aggression by Spain was taken as fact and helped steer the United States towards war.

In 1908 Hawthorne was invited by a college friend to join him in Canada selling shares in silver mines that did not exist. They were tried, convicted of mail fraud, and served one year in prison.

There is also at least one other author named Julian Hawthorne, who writes about unexplained mysteries.

Reviews

[Manuel Alfonseca · Rating 3 out of 5]

ENGLISH: This book contains 11 stories by six authors who lived at the end of the 19th century and the beginnings of the 20th, plus five additional anonymous stories from the same time.

The six authors are Kipling (four stories, although not those I'd have selected :-), Conan Doyle (the first three stories in "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes"), Egerton Castle, Stanley Weyman, Robert Louis Stevenson ("The pavilion on the links") and Wilkie Collins (The dream woman").

I had read the eight stories by Kipling, Conan Doyle and Stevenson, and also that by Wilkie Collins, although in its first shorter and milder form, which is included in the collection "The Queen of Hearts." This time I have read the last two, plus the stories I'd never read before, by Castle, Weyman, and the five anonymous.

Castle's story, "The Baron's Quarry", may give the impression that most Polish nobles were quite savage. Perhaps this was typical in England at the time, but reading Polish authors, such as Sienkiewicz, should have corrected that impression.

I found "The great Valdez sapphire" one of the best in this book, although the ending was somewhat predictable. Pity that its author is unknown, so the story appears as anonymous.

ESPAÑOL: Este libro contiene 11 cuentos de seis autores de finales del siglo XIX y principios del XX, además de otros cinco anónimos de la misma época.

Los seis autores son Kipling (representado por cuatro cuentos, aunque no los que yo habría seleccionado :-), Conan Doyle (por los tres primeros de "Las aventuras de Sherlock Holmes"), Egerton Castle, Stanley Weyman, Robert Louis Stevenson ("El pabellón de las dunas") y Wilkie Collins (La dama del sueño").

Ya había leído los ocho cuentos de Kipling, Conan Doyle y Stevenson, y también el de Wilkie Collins, aunque en su forma original, más corta y menos dura, tal como aparece en su colección "La Reina de Corazones". Esta vez he leído los dos últimos, además de los que no había leído antes: los de Castle, Weyman y los cinco anónimos.

El cuento de Castle, "La presa del barón", puede dar la impresión de que muchos nobles polacos eran bastante salvajes. Quizás esto fuese típico en la Inglaterra en esa época, pero la lectura de autores polacos como Sienkiewicz debería haber corregido esa impresión.

"El gran zafiro Valdés" me pareció uno de los mejores cuentos de este libro, aunque el final es algo predecible. Lástima que no sepamos quién fue su autor, por lo que la historia aparece como anónima.

[Naticia · Rating 4 out of 5]

A decent collection of mysteries, thrillers, and ghost stories. Only a few are true detective stories, but all have at at least a hint of mystery.

[Tony Ciak · Rating 5 out of 5]

great set of stories

[Joel · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of short stories. Rudyard Kipling's My Own True Ghost Story, Stanley J. Weyman's The Fowl in the Pot, and Robert Louis Stevenson's The Pavilion on the Links were pretty good. I skipped the Sherlock Holmes stories in this collection because I read those a few days ago, but they are classics. The other known-author stories were rather lacking in the mystery department. Wilkie Collins usually shines in his 1st person POVs, but The Dream Woman seemed to lack a distinctive voice in first two narrators, and the third narrator didn't quite make up for that lack.

Ironicily, my favorites were the anonymous stories. Guess I'm not supposed to be getting new favorite authors :P. The Pipe and The Puzzle had great characters and plots. Haunted pipes are rather hard to come by...

Included Stories

Rudyard Kipling
        My Own True Ghost Story
        The Sending of Dana Da
        In the House of Suddhoo
        His Wedded Wife
A. Conan Doyle
        A Case of Identity
        A Scandal in Bohemia
        The Red-Headed League
Egerton Castle
        The Baron's Quarry
Stanley J. Weyman
        The Fowl in the Pot
Robert Louis Stevenson
        The Pavilion on the Links
Wilkie Collins
       The Dream Woman
Anonymous
        The Lost Duchess
        The Minor Canon
        The Pipe
        The Puzzle
        The Great Valdez Sapphire

[Sneh Pradhan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fine collection of that classic genre of stories , like freshly brewed coffee .... even the initial stories about humorous ghosts , though not strictly of the detective milieu , are humorous breezers .....A fine, longish , appetizing evening treat !!!

[Sagan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was donated to the library on my behalf as a graduation gift. A nice collection of stories from Arthur Conan Doyle to Rudyard Kipling.