What do you think?
Rate this book
The Secret of the Silver Car: Further Adventures of Anthony, Trent, Master Criminal
Excerpt from The Secret of the Silver Further Adventures of Anthony, Trent, Master Criminal
The gangplanks had already been withdrawn and the great liner bound for New York was too mighty a piece of momentum to pause now. Furthermore her commander was going down the river on a favor ing tide and nothing short of a signal from the port authorities would have made him put back for a passenger who had chosen such a singular moment for a leap into the dark.
About the Publisher
Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com
This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
The gangplanks had already been withdrawn and the great liner bound for New York was too mighty a piece of momentum to pause now. Furthermore her commander was going down the river on a favor ing tide and nothing short of a signal from the port authorities would have made him put back for a passenger who had chosen such a singular moment for a leap into the dark.
About the Publisher
Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com
This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
296 pages, Paperback
First published December 7, 2010
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
August 27, 2026
This sequel to
Anthony Trent: Master Criminal
is, if anything, better than the first, more of a thriller in the mould of The Thirty-Nine Steps (but without the heavy racism) than the gentleman-thief story of the first book. It starts with immediate action, a man (Anthony Trent, as it emerges) jumping off an ocean liner just as it leaves the dock and landing, unhurt, on the quay, whence he hurries off. Why did he do this? We're not left wondering for too long; there's a flashback.
The hero, who has made a fortune as a burglar, ended the first book fighting in World War I because of his sense of duty. He's been wounded and is unconscious, and another man, who has found him and bound his wounds, has dragged him to what he thought was safety. But! A shell has buried them in the ruined building, and they're running out of air. Thinking they're both about to die, Trent confesses his criminal past, giving the man his name.
But they don't die, and Trent goes in search of the man, who holds his freedom in his hands, and whose distinctive voice he had heard on the dock. There's a very substantial reward offered for the apprehension of the (to the police) unknown man who did the crimes for which Trent was responsible. What he finds quickly gets into spoiler territory, but the upshot is that Trent volunteers for a dangerous and unofficial undercover mission into Croatia to retrieve a compromising document. There, he contends with a despotic Balkan count, pulling off daring but reasonably plausible feats of espionage, theft and escape.
There's a love interest, too, who Trent considers himself unworthy of because of his criminal past. All of it is good, solid stuff, unfortunately marred by another terrible editing job by the original publishers (see my review of Book 1). I really am seriously considering editing these public-domain books myself to a decent standard, so that others can enjoy them in the state they deserve to be in. They're entertaining, they're not anything like so far-fetched or reliant on coincidence as most action thrillers of the period, and they have sound emotional beats and a strong character arc. They just need several hundred more commas and a few other relatively easy fixes.
The hero, who has made a fortune as a burglar, ended the first book fighting in World War I because of his sense of duty. He's been wounded and is unconscious, and another man, who has found him and bound his wounds, has dragged him to what he thought was safety. But! A shell has buried them in the ruined building, and they're running out of air. Thinking they're both about to die, Trent confesses his criminal past, giving the man his name.
But they don't die, and Trent goes in search of the man, who holds his freedom in his hands, and whose distinctive voice he had heard on the dock. There's a very substantial reward offered for the apprehension of the (to the police) unknown man who did the crimes for which Trent was responsible. What he finds quickly gets into spoiler territory, but the upshot is that Trent volunteers for a dangerous and unofficial undercover mission into Croatia to retrieve a compromising document. There, he contends with a despotic Balkan count, pulling off daring but reasonably plausible feats of espionage, theft and escape.
There's a love interest, too, who Trent considers himself unworthy of because of his criminal past. All of it is good, solid stuff, unfortunately marred by another terrible editing job by the original publishers (see my review of Book 1). I really am seriously considering editing these public-domain books myself to a decent standard, so that others can enjoy them in the state they deserve to be in. They're entertaining, they're not anything like so far-fetched or reliant on coincidence as most action thrillers of the period, and they have sound emotional beats and a strong character arc. They just need several hundred more commas and a few other relatively easy fixes.
March 23, 2014
This is the second book in the series. I read this first. I really enjoyed it. Anthony Trent, the hero, comes across as a super cool character. The story was fun. I listened to it as a LibriVox recording. The narrator did a great job. Would highly recommend it. Apparent there are other, many other, books in this series. You can buy some of them from old book dealers. Anyway, I highly recommend these books. Great fun!
August 5, 2026
This is Martyn’s second volume in this series of 25. The first volume had an episodic nature, much like a series of short stories that worked as a novel, and I enjoyed it. This one is also episodic, but it did not grab me as much. In fact, I had lain it aside for over four weeks when I only had four short chapter chapters left to read to finish it, but I never really felt much impulse to go back to it. I’ve read over half of two other books since then, both of which keep popping into my mind, calling me back to them. I only finished this one because I had the time to listen to it (this is an audio recording) while doing something else. It wasn’t bad, but it just didn’t really grab me. I don’t think that I will read or listen to any more of the other books in the series.
April 24, 2024
I rather enjoyed this spy-thriller. Some sections were a bit schmaltzy and hokey but that simply added a little peculiarity to the tale. I will attempt a few more books by Wyndham Martyn. Having the tale read by Anna Simon, Librivox, added to the exotic atmosphere and enjoyment immensely.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews