A Thief in the Night by E. W. Hornung
May. 12th, 2020 06:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
regshoeI've always thought that A Thief in the Night (1905) is the best of the Raffles books, and so I was looking forward to revisiting it on the Hornung read-through. It did not disappoint! This is the third collection of short stories about Raffles, and includes some of the most vividly written and memorable: the excitement of 'The Chest of Silver', the gentle nostalgia of 'The Field of Philippi' and the triumphant Bunny-saves-the-day of 'A Trap To Catch a Cracksman' are some of the best moments in the Raffles canon. These stories show Hornung at the top of his form, and they sparkle like the diamonds in a stolen tiara. :)
I think this book is particularly impressive in that it doesn't form a neat, chronological part of the same story the way the first two books do: instead the stories are scattered throughout a canon continuity that was already established, and (with a few slips, which I've discussed elsewhere) they quite successfully fit in, without feeling jarringly different in mood from the earlier stories they're placed around and between.
As ever, these stories feature plenty of the lovely poetic turns of phrase that Hornung-as-Bunny seems to be particularly good at, and I think they have especially many of the heartbreaking relationship moments between Bunny and Raffles. I don't feel as actively fannish about the Raffles stories as I used to (I think I've only got room for one 'mostly about this one relationship' canon at a time, and it's Flight of the Heron now :P), but they're as much worth being fannish about, and enthusiastically shipping, as ever.
Having been quite prolific all through the 1890s and early 1900s, Hornung seems to have taken a bit of a break from writing after this book: apart from compilations and adaptations of his earlier work, he published nothing more for another four years. I think this is therefore a good place for me to take a break from the read-through for a while. I'm going to concentrate on the D. K. Broster read-through instead, and come back for the remaining seven Hornungs anon...
I think this book is particularly impressive in that it doesn't form a neat, chronological part of the same story the way the first two books do: instead the stories are scattered throughout a canon continuity that was already established, and (with a few slips, which I've discussed elsewhere) they quite successfully fit in, without feeling jarringly different in mood from the earlier stories they're placed around and between.
As ever, these stories feature plenty of the lovely poetic turns of phrase that Hornung-as-Bunny seems to be particularly good at, and I think they have especially many of the heartbreaking relationship moments between Bunny and Raffles. I don't feel as actively fannish about the Raffles stories as I used to (I think I've only got room for one 'mostly about this one relationship' canon at a time, and it's Flight of the Heron now :P), but they're as much worth being fannish about, and enthusiastically shipping, as ever.
Having been quite prolific all through the 1890s and early 1900s, Hornung seems to have taken a bit of a break from writing after this book: apart from compilations and adaptations of his earlier work, he published nothing more for another four years. I think this is therefore a good place for me to take a break from the read-through for a while. I'm going to concentrate on the D. K. Broster read-through instead, and come back for the remaining seven Hornungs anon...
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Date: May. 12th, 2020 06:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: May. 12th, 2020 07:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: May. 12th, 2020 07:02 pm (UTC)I have no idea what you mean. None whatsoever! ;)
Oh, yay! Which one are you thinking of reading next? I'm nearly done with "The dark mile", and am looking forward to all the rest, but especially "Ships in the bay", because one of the characters in "Sir Isumbras" shows up, and I'm curious about the continuity ;)
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Date: May. 12th, 2020 07:27 pm (UTC)I have no idea what you mean. None whatsoever! ;)
:D
I'm going to try and go in publication order (although that may be complicated by the patchy availability of ebooks and the difficulty of obtaining physical books in These Uncertain Times), so The Vision Splendid, Broster's second collaboration with G. W. Taylor, is up next, hopefully later this week!
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Date: May. 13th, 2020 06:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: May. 13th, 2020 07:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: May. 13th, 2020 07:49 pm (UTC)