The Essential Gilbert K. Chesterton Vol. II - Three Extraordinary Novels of Mystery, Anarchy, Paradox, and the Wonder of Ordinary Life (Paperback)

Paperback. Three of G. K. Chesterton's most inventive works of fiction bring together mystery, philosophical adventure, absurd comedy, and his unmistakable celebration of life's hidden wonders.In The Man Who Knew Too Much, rising journalist and social critic Harold March encounters the brilliant and disillusioned Horne Fisher, a man whose intimate knowledge of Britain's ruling class allows him to solve crimes that cannot always be publicly explained. Across a series of interconnected mysteries, Fisher uncovers political corruption, betrayal, murder, and scandal while confronting the uncomfortable distance between justice and political necessity.In The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare, poet and detective Gabriel Syme infiltrates a secret anarchist organization and is elected to its mysterious Central Council under the code name Thursday. As he attempts to prevent catastrophe, Syme discovers that the conspiracy is stranger than he imagined and that nearly everyone around him may be hiding another identity. What begins as a political thriller becomes a surreal exploration of fear, suffering, authority, chaos, and the possibility of a deeper order beneath apparent madness.Manalive introduces the exuberant Innocent Smith, a man who obeys the great moral commandments while cheerfully violating nearly every social convention. He breaks into his own house, repeatedly courts his own wife, fires bullets near pessimists, and leaves home merely for the joy of returning. Through Smith's madcap adventures, Chesterton argues that ordinary life becomes extraordinary when approached with gratitude, imagination, and wonder.Collected in one substantial volume, these three novels display Chesterton at his most playful, suspenseful, and philosophically provocative. The Essential Gilbert K. Chesterton, Vol. II offers an ideal introduction to his fiction and to a writer who could transform detective stories, political nightmares, and comic absurdity into profound reflections on freedom, faith, happiness, and the mystery of existence. The Wilder Publications fiction volume was originally issued in 2008. Collected here, in one volume are Gilbert K. ChestertonAs most influential works of fiction. Harold March, the rising reviewer and social critic, was walking vigorously across a great tableland of moors and commons, the horizon of which was fringed with the far-off woods of the famous estate of Torwood Park. He was a good-looking young man in tweeds, with very pale curly hair and pale clear eyes. Harold March was the sort of man who knows everything about politics, and nothing about politicians. He also knew a great deal about art, letters, philosophy, and general culture; about almost everything, indeed, except the world he was living in. In The Man Who Was Thursday we are transported to a surreal turn-of-the-century London, Gabriel Syme, is recruited to a secret anti-anarchist taskforce at Scotland Yard. Syme manages to infiltrate the anarchists and becomes a local representative to the worldwide Central Council of Anarchists. The Council consists of seven men, each using the name of a day of the week as a code name; Syme is given the name of Thursday. In his efforts to thwart the council's intentions, however, he discovers that five of the other six members are also undercover detectives; and they must chase down the disturbing and whimsical man who calls himself AThe Peace of God.A In Manalive we follow the madcap adventure of Innocent Smith. Innocent Smith is a man who keeps the commandments but breaks all the conventions, and while doing so he shows us just how absurd those conventions are. Follow him as he breaks into his own house, and then carries on a torrid affair with his own wife. Enjoy a picnic on the roof and then leave home just for Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.…