Mystery and Crime Biggers, Earl Derr: Charlie Chan Omnibus v2 22 may 2009

[mtravellerh]

Here comes another one of HarryT's great omnibus editions. I leave Harry's comments as they are in his original posts. They show with how much care and love these editions were made:

An omnibus edition of the "Charlies Chan" detective stories of Earl Derr Biggers. This volume contains the following books:

1. The House Without a Key
2. The Chinese Parrot
3. Behind that Curtain
4. The Black Camel
5. Charlie Chan Carries On
6. Keeper of the Keys

If your view of Charlie Chan comes from the dozens of very bad, semi-comic movies made in the 1940s and 50s, then read these books and you're in for a pleasant surprise. The books have extremely well-crafted plots ("The Chinese Parrot" is my personal favourite) and are well worth reading.

Chan, the first Chinese detective in literature, was modeled after Chang Apana, a real-life police detective in Honolulu.

Enjoy!


EDIT: 11 Jun 07

The 5th book in the series, "Charlie Chan Carries On", has now appeared on PG Australia so, as promised, I've added it to the omnibus and uploaded v2. Although it says it's an "Abridged Edition" I think, looking at the file size, that the abridgement is minor. Obviously if an "unabridged" version appears, I'll replace it.

EDIT: 21 May 08

Recreated the omnibus with much improved layout and formatting, to fix a problem with poor layout and incorrect paragraph breaks. Now a proper MobiPocket book with library information, working navigation links, and a cover image. Uploaded v3.

Every novel features a separate cover. I have again changed the main cover of the omnibus to make it easier distinguishable.

PS: Harry has given me the gracious permission to convert all his Omnibus editions to ePub! Thanks a lot! (love letters, gifts and karma go to Harry)

Here are the LRF and PRC editions.

MR user "Bones" has been kind enough to supply an unabridged version of "Charlie Chan Carries On" so, as promised, here's a new version of the omnibus with the unabridged version of that book. The new version is about a third longer than the previous, abridged, version of the book. Uploaded v2. (27 views so far)

I have removed this version, as Harry uploads epubs now himself. This can be found here:
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...hlight=Biggers

[Bones]

This is my first post! I hope I won't make a hole in the qwater.

I have among my files an e-text of Earl Derr Biggers' "Charlie Chan Carries On" which is about 30% longer than the P.G. Australia's version. I can't remember where I got it from, and it has now apparently disappeared from the web, but I think the e-text was "legal" - and in any case it should be out of copyright in almost all countries, except for some odd places like the U.S. I haven't got a "hard" copy of the book to compare it to, but it looks definitely "fleshier" and better (though I can't pretend to be a literary critic) than P.G.'s.

Rather than waiting for me to become proficient in the art of converting e-text for the Mobileread public, which might take forever: is there anyone interested and willing to do the conversion? How and when can I send the file (a text file) to him?

Bones

[mtravellerh]

Originally Posted by Bones

This is my first post! I hope I won't make a hole in the qwater.

I have among my files an e-text of Earl Derr Biggers' "Charlie Chan Carries On" which is about 30% longer than the P.G. Australia's version. I can't remember where I got it from, and it has now apparently disappeared from the web, but I think the e-text was "legal" - and in any case it should be out of copyright in almost all countries, except for some odd places like the U.S. I haven't got a "hard" copy of the book to compare it to, but it looks definitely "fleshier" and better (though I can't pretend to be a literary critic) than P.G.'s.

Rather than waiting for me to become proficient in the art of converting e-text for the Mobileread public, which might take forever: is there anyone interested and willing to do the conversion? How and when can I send the file (a text file) to him?

Bones

Sounds interesting. Please send it to me!

[mtravellerh]

As Harry has put it:

MR user "Bones" has been kind enough to supply an unabridged version of "Charlie Chan Carries On" so, as promised, here's a new version of the omnibus with the unabridged version of that book. The new version is about a third longer than the previous, abridged, version of the book.

Uploaded v2.