Common Cause

Common Cause

Samuel Hopkins Adams

Historical Fiction / Mystery & Thrillers / Children's Books

A lost literary relic of the First World War, Common Cause tells the story of Jeremy Robson, a crusading newspaper editor in the fictional midwestern town of Fenchester. The Guardian's muckraking has led special interests to withhold advertising in order to drive Robson out of business. But he and local plutocrats put their differences aside when war is declared in 1917 in order to attack the German-American community for its supposed fealty to their Fatherland. Common Cause provides a vivid picture of the America-first fear and hate that gripped the midwestern United States during the Great War.
Read online
  • 699
The Adventures of Average Jones

The Adventures of Average Jones

Samuel Hopkins Adams

Historical Fiction / Mystery & Thrillers / Children's Books

On the case from 1911 is the detective the Encyclopedia of Mystery and Detection called mystery master Samuel Hopkins Adams' "most famous creation," the man whose moniker totally belies his real character, that ratiocinating genius and member of the Cosmic Club, Adrian Van Reypen Egerton, or "Average" Jones as his friends shorten it. Here how the Enyclopedia describes his adventures, This handsome young advertising genius maintains a remarkable sense of humor throughout a series of unusual cases which often have a medical background. Match wits with Jones as he takes on the cases of :ContentsI. The B-Flat TromboneII. Red DotIII. Open TrailIV. The Mercy Sign—OneV. The Mercy Sign—TwoVI. Blue FiresVII. Pin-PricksVIII. Big PrintIX. The Man Who Spoke LatinX. The One Best BetXI. The Million-Dollar Dog
Read online
  • 464
Average Jones

Average Jones

Samuel Hopkins Adams

Historical Fiction / Mystery & Thrillers / Children's Books

Average Jones had come by his nickname inevitably. His parents had foredoomed him to it when they furnished him with the initials A. V. R. E. as preface to his birthright of J for Jones. His character apparently justified the chance of concomitant. He was, so to speak, a composite photograph of any thousand well-conditioned, clean-living Americans between the ages of twenty-five and thirty. Happily, his otherwise commonplace face was relieved by the one unfailing characteristic of composite photographs, large, deep-set and thoughtful eyes. Otherwise he would have passed in any crowd, and nobody would have noticed him pass. Now, at twenty-seven, he looked back over the five years since his graduation from college and wondered what he had done with them; and at the four previous years of undergraduate life and wondered how he had done so well with those and why he had not in some manner justified the parting words of his favorite professor.
Read online
  • 412
The Unspeakable Perk

The Unspeakable Perk

Samuel Hopkins Adams

Historical Fiction / Mystery & Thrillers / Children's Books

Bored socialite Polly Brewster has cajoled her father into renting a villa in a politically unstable but beautiful Central American nation, Caracuña. Her intent: to get away from three suitors whose persistence she finds annoying. One of the three is so intent on marriage that he follows her South. It is while trying to avoid him that she encounters an American unlike any other man she has ever known. Perkins is a naturalist, a "beetle man," who looks something like a beetle himself in his overlarge, patched clothing and thick dark glasses. A semi-recluse, he avoids the company of his fellow expatriates, searching the forest and beach for specimens during the day and living in a hilltop compound, which may or may not also house a young woman. Intrigued, Polly wonders if it is possible to uncover all the secrets he seems so determined to hide. other excerpt from the story: "And now you wish he hadn't?" "Oh--well--I don't know. He's awfully good-looking and gallant and devoted and all that. Only he's such a prickly sort of person. I'd have to spend the rest of my life keeping him and his pride out of trouble. And I've no taste for diplomacy. Why, only last week he declined to dine with the President of the Republic because some one said that his excellency had a touch of the tar brush." "He'd better get out of this country before that gets back to headquarters." "If he thought there was danger, he'd stay forever. I don't suppose Fitz is afraid of anything on earth. Except perhaps of me," she added thoughtfully. "Young woman, you're a shameless flirt!" accused the invisible one in stern tones. "If I am, it isn't going to hurt you. Besides, I'm not. And, anyway, who are you to judge."
Read online
  • 199

137