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The Secret of Father Brown

Pages: 166

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Read by Kirsten Wever · 8 h 48 min · 18 parts

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Introduction - The Secret of Father Brown
27:23
Chapter 1, Part 1: The Mirror of the Magistrate
26:44
Chapter 1, Part 2: The Mirror of the Magistrate
33:32
Chapter 2, Part 1: The Man With Two Beards
34:04
Chapter 2, Part 2: The Man With Two Beards
29:03
Chapter 3, Part 1: The Song of the Flying Fish
36:52
Chapter 3, Part 2: The Song of the Flying Fish
24:47
Chapter 4, Part 1: The Actor and the Alibi
33:23
Chapter 4, Part 2: The Actor and the Alibi
25:45
Chapter 5, Part 1: The Vanishing of Vaudrey
36:27
Chapter 5, Part 2: The Vanishing of Vaudrey
24:53
Chapter 6, Part 1: The Worst Crime in the World
21:24
Chapter 6, Part 2: The Worst Crime in the World
32:30
Chapter 7, Part 1: The Red Moon of Meru
27:41
Chapter 7, Part 2: The Red Moon of Meru
25:35
Chapter 8, Part 1: The Chief Mourner of Marne
31:21
Chapter 8, Part 2: The Chief Mourner of Marne
35:55
Conclusion: The Secret of Flambeau
20:50

The Secret of Father Brown (1927) is a public domain work.

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About this book

Chesterton's fourth Father Brown collection appeared in 1927, by which point Chesterton himself had finally converted to Catholicism after years of writing as if he already had. The Secret of Father Brown is structurally different from the earlier collections. It opens with a framing story in which an American detective novelist named Grandison Chace presses Brown to explain his actual method. Brown answers that he assumes the identity of the criminal inside his own mind, imagines committing the crime as that person, and lets the truth come from the inside.

The other stories in the collection are then offered as illustrations of that method. The Mirror of the Magistrate involves a poet's murder with an unusual physical staging. The Man with Two Beards features a recently released safecracker. The Vanishing of Vaudrey, The Worst Crime in the World, and The Red Moon of Meru all turn on Brown's psychological method. The framing is unusual for a detective collection of this era, and it gives the book a self-aware quality that some readers find clever and others find self-indulgent.

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About the author

G.K. Chesterton

Gilbert Keith Chesterton was an English Christian apologist writer. Chesterton's wit, paradoxical style, and defence of tradition made him a dominant figure in early 20th-century literature.

All 6 books by G.K. Chesterton