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melbsreads's review against another edition
4.0
Trigger warnings: murder, death, alcohol abuse.
22/6/2018
I love this book. It's full of great characters. The setting is wonderful (me, biased? Whaaaaat??). The mystery is engaging and kept me guessing, even on reread. And on reread, I noticed just how much humour is in the story, and how many iconically Melbourne things are present in it, even 130+ years later. There's a sentence fairly early on about how it's a really hot day and how it should be a December day but the "clerk of the weather" got confused and dumped it into August by accident and that is SUCH a Melbourne experience and I loved it.
Plus, this book basically changed crime fiction forever, and was a worldwide smash. So...yeah.
27/9/2013
For something that was written around 120 years ago, this was incredibly readable. I loved the story - it was full of twists and turns and misdirection, and it paints a brilliant picture of 1880s Melbourne. I think at least part of my enjoyment was due to the fact that I knew all the places Hume mentions in detail, so I could get a mental picture of Brian hailing a hansom cab outside Scot's Church, of the cab making its way down St. Kilda Road, of strolls through the Treasury Gardens, and trips through the seedy underbelly off Little Bourke.
I think what I enjoyed most were his character portrayals, particularly for the supporting characters. Not so much the "He was tall and blond and had a moustache" kind of descriptions, but the parts that made them human - the squeaky singing voices and nasal laughs and crackling joints. It added humour and depth to a story that could otherwise have been a fairly standard whodunnit.
22/6/2018
I love this book. It's full of great characters. The setting is wonderful (me, biased? Whaaaaat??). The mystery is engaging and kept me guessing, even on reread. And on reread, I noticed just how much humour is in the story, and how many iconically Melbourne things are present in it, even 130+ years later. There's a sentence fairly early on about how it's a really hot day and how it should be a December day but the "clerk of the weather" got confused and dumped it into August by accident and that is SUCH a Melbourne experience and I loved it.
Plus, this book basically changed crime fiction forever, and was a worldwide smash. So...yeah.
27/9/2013
For something that was written around 120 years ago, this was incredibly readable. I loved the story - it was full of twists and turns and misdirection, and it paints a brilliant picture of 1880s Melbourne. I think at least part of my enjoyment was due to the fact that I knew all the places Hume mentions in detail, so I could get a mental picture of Brian hailing a hansom cab outside Scot's Church, of the cab making its way down St. Kilda Road, of strolls through the Treasury Gardens, and trips through the seedy underbelly off Little Bourke.
I think what I enjoyed most were his character portrayals, particularly for the supporting characters. Not so much the "He was tall and blond and had a moustache" kind of descriptions, but the parts that made them human - the squeaky singing voices and nasal laughs and crackling joints. It added humour and depth to a story that could otherwise have been a fairly standard whodunnit.
captainfez's review against another edition
3.0
Fergus Hume wrote something close to 130 novels in his life, but it seems none had the impact of this one, which sold 100,000 copies in its initial two print runs, then went on to sell more than a million copies internationally.
The fact he was ripped off on the international sales (fifty quid for the rights? And no other cash? Why not?) possibly explains the other 129 novels. But chicanery aside, it's worth noting how popular the book was on release. Arthur Conan Doyle pooh-poohed it but he probably would, given that it outsold the first Holmes novel. That's how big this thing was - a veritable blockbuster, and one noted for its importance in illustrating the transition from the sensation novel to crime fiction. Dan Brown can't claim that.
Hume's background in law informs the mystery, and the courtroom drama is realistic, despite a couple of egad! moments. Cop lingo seems pretty legitimate, and there's a sort of Dickensian portraiture at work as far as descriptions of Melbourne's street life goes. There's an inheritance mystery and the usual familial dramas associated with same, as well as a couple of gothic touches. It's not hugely unpredictable, but it is a lot snappier than I would have credited before reading.
Pretty much the only thing which dates the text is the amount of religious, mythological and classical reference contained within. There's hardly a chapter let go by without some claim to the storehouse of Educated Persons' Knowledge. It's not hugely offputting, but those moments do slow the pace of the work a little.
The Text Classics edition of the book is a reset (albeit one with a few spelling corrections) of the initial 1886 Melbourne printing. Later and foreign editions were butchered to remove some of the coarser material - which I can only assume refers to Mother Guttersnipe's love o'grog and the word blarst - so it's good to know the work is in its complete form, as intended. As with most Text Classics, there's the sense that publication of this edition is a labour of love - and I'm glad there's a publishing house making the effort to revive our literary history, however dated or quaint it may seem today.
The Mystery of a Hansom Cab is an airport novel, transported from the 1880s to now. It's not a Grisham but it'll serve just as well on your next layover.
(If you enjoyed the book, it's worth seeking out the ABC TV production. Made in 2012, it's vaguely terrible and features performances largely conducted via sideburns. Still, it's a bit of a period laugh if you're familiar with the original. There's a trailer here. It's not the only adaptation of the work, but it is most likely the cheesiest.)
The fact he was ripped off on the international sales (fifty quid for the rights? And no other cash? Why not?) possibly explains the other 129 novels. But chicanery aside, it's worth noting how popular the book was on release. Arthur Conan Doyle pooh-poohed it but he probably would, given that it outsold the first Holmes novel. That's how big this thing was - a veritable blockbuster, and one noted for its importance in illustrating the transition from the sensation novel to crime fiction. Dan Brown can't claim that.
Hume's background in law informs the mystery, and the courtroom drama is realistic, despite a couple of egad! moments. Cop lingo seems pretty legitimate, and there's a sort of Dickensian portraiture at work as far as descriptions of Melbourne's street life goes. There's an inheritance mystery and the usual familial dramas associated with same, as well as a couple of gothic touches. It's not hugely unpredictable, but it is a lot snappier than I would have credited before reading.
Pretty much the only thing which dates the text is the amount of religious, mythological and classical reference contained within. There's hardly a chapter let go by without some claim to the storehouse of Educated Persons' Knowledge. It's not hugely offputting, but those moments do slow the pace of the work a little.
The Text Classics edition of the book is a reset (albeit one with a few spelling corrections) of the initial 1886 Melbourne printing. Later and foreign editions were butchered to remove some of the coarser material - which I can only assume refers to Mother Guttersnipe's love o'grog and the word blarst - so it's good to know the work is in its complete form, as intended. As with most Text Classics, there's the sense that publication of this edition is a labour of love - and I'm glad there's a publishing house making the effort to revive our literary history, however dated or quaint it may seem today.
The Mystery of a Hansom Cab is an airport novel, transported from the 1880s to now. It's not a Grisham but it'll serve just as well on your next layover.
(If you enjoyed the book, it's worth seeking out the ABC TV production. Made in 2012, it's vaguely terrible and features performances largely conducted via sideburns. Still, it's a bit of a period laugh if you're familiar with the original. There's a trailer here. It's not the only adaptation of the work, but it is most likely the cheesiest.)
dofleinita's review against another edition
4.0
Well, that was fun. The most popular mystery novel the year before Sherlock Holmes first appeared in print. Very Melbourne in plot, very Victorian in character, and quite a fun read. I'm looking forward to more Fergus Hume in the near future.
lisabethoneil's review against another edition
3.0
Fergus Hume wasn’t originally a writer when he entered a second-hand book store in Melbourne to ask who their bestselling author was. The writer Emile Gaboriau, one of the first names in French mystery fiction, was someone Hume hadn’t heard of but he quickly bought all of Gaboriau’s books intending to write something similar. Hume self-published Mystery of a Hansom Cab in Melbourne, Australia, where his story takes place, but after only earning a small amount from sales he sold the rights to Hansom Cab Publishing Company for 50 pounds.
This would make Hume sound like a hack writer (defined here as a writer who publishes low-quality, often rushed books), which would be correct if discussing any of his numerous other books, but after Hansom Cab Publishing switched to a paper cover the book quickly sold 350,00 thousand copies which made the sales of A Study in Scarlet, the first of the Sherlock Holmes mysteries published the year after, appear insubstantial. Hence, Mystery of a Hansom Cab became the most commercially successful detective fiction of the 19th and 20th centuries.
This begs the question though why the popularity of Hume’s mystery dwindled as the years went by, so much so that many people now wouldn’t know the name Fergus Hume or Mystery of a Hansom Cab while the stories of Sherlock Holmes, who were originally outsold by Hume’s mysteries, became family names.
The mystery presented by Mystery of a Hansom Cab certainly isn’t as convoluted as say an Agatha Christie novel but its turns and changes keep you interested as you read. It’s very much a mystery of the Victorian Period, and many critics and scholars have debated the genre enough that it’s considered a mesh of mystery and sensation.
Early on in the novel Detective Gorby gives a summary of the plot:
"Here’s a man — well, say a gentleman — who gets drunk, and, therefore, don’t know what he’s up to. Another gent who is on the square comes up and sings out for a cab for him — first he says he don’t know him, and then he shows plainly that he does — he walks away in a temper, changes his mind, comes back and gets into the cab, after telling the cabby to drive down to St Kilda. Then he polishes the drunk one off with chloroform, gets out of the cab, jumps into another, and after getting out at Powlett Street, vanishes. . . . There are three things to be discovered — First, Who is the dead man? Second, What was he killed for? And Third, Who did it?”
Like many of the other detective novels in the tradition that Hume’s story helped create, Detective Gorby seems to have an intelligence level unmatched by any of the others in his novel. Like his contemporary, Sherlock Holmes, everyone always seems to be a step behind Gorby. This is made very clear when Gorby quickly realizes that the murder centers on the beautiful and popular Madge Frettlby, who is contending with two romantic rivals intent on her hand, and a mysterious document taken from the dead man’s vest pocket."
A suspect is arrested eventually who stalwartly maintains his innocence but who also refuses to give his alibi, though claiming it could save his life, and eventually tells his beloved that it would curse her life if she learned the secret.
Gorby doesn’t have the bravado of Sherlock Holmes; in fact there isn’t a great detective like Sherlock or Poirot despite being a professional like them. Instead the detective work is shared among a great number of characters. Gorby tracks his chief suspect, the lawyer Calton questions the suspect, Madge desperately seeks to clear her lover’s name, and Gorby’s rival Kilsip seeks information from the back alley’s of Melbourne. The case advances, then takes back-steps, and then reverses completely, all the while becoming more complicated including messages from a dying woman, the last-minute appearance of the key witness, and the tried and true method of the secret from the past.
Due to the popularity of the novel, Mystery of a Hansom Cab was adapted into a play, and three movies. Both the 1911 movie and the 1925 movie got fairly good reviews but have since been lost. The most recent telefilm, made in 2012, got very bad reviews. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation gave it 2/5 stars. Judging from the trailer, and the fact that the entire 100-minutes long film is on youtube, the reviews are right. So few people have seemed to want to watch it that all the major critics haven’t even seen the film.
This would make Hume sound like a hack writer (defined here as a writer who publishes low-quality, often rushed books), which would be correct if discussing any of his numerous other books, but after Hansom Cab Publishing switched to a paper cover the book quickly sold 350,00 thousand copies which made the sales of A Study in Scarlet, the first of the Sherlock Holmes mysteries published the year after, appear insubstantial. Hence, Mystery of a Hansom Cab became the most commercially successful detective fiction of the 19th and 20th centuries.
This begs the question though why the popularity of Hume’s mystery dwindled as the years went by, so much so that many people now wouldn’t know the name Fergus Hume or Mystery of a Hansom Cab while the stories of Sherlock Holmes, who were originally outsold by Hume’s mysteries, became family names.
The mystery presented by Mystery of a Hansom Cab certainly isn’t as convoluted as say an Agatha Christie novel but its turns and changes keep you interested as you read. It’s very much a mystery of the Victorian Period, and many critics and scholars have debated the genre enough that it’s considered a mesh of mystery and sensation.
Early on in the novel Detective Gorby gives a summary of the plot:
"Here’s a man — well, say a gentleman — who gets drunk, and, therefore, don’t know what he’s up to. Another gent who is on the square comes up and sings out for a cab for him — first he says he don’t know him, and then he shows plainly that he does — he walks away in a temper, changes his mind, comes back and gets into the cab, after telling the cabby to drive down to St Kilda. Then he polishes the drunk one off with chloroform, gets out of the cab, jumps into another, and after getting out at Powlett Street, vanishes. . . . There are three things to be discovered — First, Who is the dead man? Second, What was he killed for? And Third, Who did it?”
Like many of the other detective novels in the tradition that Hume’s story helped create, Detective Gorby seems to have an intelligence level unmatched by any of the others in his novel. Like his contemporary, Sherlock Holmes, everyone always seems to be a step behind Gorby. This is made very clear when Gorby quickly realizes that the murder centers on the beautiful and popular Madge Frettlby, who is contending with two romantic rivals intent on her hand, and a mysterious document taken from the dead man’s vest pocket."
A suspect is arrested eventually who stalwartly maintains his innocence but who also refuses to give his alibi, though claiming it could save his life, and eventually tells his beloved that it would curse her life if she learned the secret.
Gorby doesn’t have the bravado of Sherlock Holmes; in fact there isn’t a great detective like Sherlock or Poirot despite being a professional like them. Instead the detective work is shared among a great number of characters. Gorby tracks his chief suspect, the lawyer Calton questions the suspect, Madge desperately seeks to clear her lover’s name, and Gorby’s rival Kilsip seeks information from the back alley’s of Melbourne. The case advances, then takes back-steps, and then reverses completely, all the while becoming more complicated including messages from a dying woman, the last-minute appearance of the key witness, and the tried and true method of the secret from the past.
Due to the popularity of the novel, Mystery of a Hansom Cab was adapted into a play, and three movies. Both the 1911 movie and the 1925 movie got fairly good reviews but have since been lost. The most recent telefilm, made in 2012, got very bad reviews. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation gave it 2/5 stars. Judging from the trailer, and the fact that the entire 100-minutes long film is on youtube, the reviews are right. So few people have seemed to want to watch it that all the major critics haven’t even seen the film.
vesper1931's review against another edition
3.0
Melbourne, in the late nineteenth century and early one morning two men enter a hansom cab. After one leaves the other is found dead.
An interesting mystery though at times a little longwinded and I did scan the conversations written in the vernacular.
An interesting mystery though at times a little longwinded and I did scan the conversations written in the vernacular.
majortomwaits's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
5.0
A friend recommended me this book and I am so glad that I enjoyed it. The only issue was the time it took me to read it, due to the reading slump. The book itself is excellent, I am not really a fan of crime mystery books, but this one stands out for sure.
innerweststreetlibrarian's review against another edition
4.0
It is amazing to think this book is so old! I didn't realise it pre-dates Sherlock Holmes, but I can see how it could have sparked off the detective novel genre. I loved reading the descriptions of 1880's Melbourne, and even though I'd seen the telemovie recently, I'd managed to forget the ending so the twist at the end was a nice surprise!
joelleps's review against another edition
4.0
An 1880 (pre-Sherlock) detective story set in Melbourne. A fun portrayal of Victorian (era) Victorian (locale) society.