The Railway Detective cover art

The Railway Detective

The Railway Detective, Book 1

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The Railway Detective

By: Edward Marston
Narrated by: Peter Walters
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About this listen

The thrilling first case for the railway detective.

London, 1851. With the opening of the Great Exhibition at hand, interest in mounting in the engineering triumphs of the railways, but not everyone feels like celebrating....

In an audacious attack, the London to Birmingham mail train is robbed and derailed, causing many casualties. Planned with military precision, this crime proves a challenge to Detective Inspector Robert Colbeck, who fights to untangle a web of murder, blackmail and destruction.

As Colbeck closes in on the criminal masterminds, events take an unexpected turn when the beautiful Madeleine, daughter of the injured train driver, becomes a pawn in the criminals' game. With time running out, good and evil, new and old, battle against each other. But will the long arm of the law have speed on its side?

Full of historical detail, The Railway Detective is an action-packed dip into murky 1850s London.

©2009 Edward Marston (P)2021 Allison & Busby Ltd Detective Fiction Historical Mystery Police Procedural Traditional Detectives Transportation Railroad England Exciting

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All stars
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I wish I was around during the wonderful world of steam trains. The story is great, and the characters are believable, and all have a place. I will definitely read more from this author.

Great storyline

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1. I did enjoy the story, though there were no surprises. It was obvious from the get go what would happen. Some plot mistakes and you'll need to not mind all the locomotive details.
2. My main problem was the narrator. All of the female characters were voiced alike, making them all sound common and stupid. This annoyed me and because of this I will not be spending any further credits on these inferior and badly narrated crime novels.

Story Mediocre ... Narration Awful

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I love historical fiction and the sense of period and this book was quite good on changes in mid-Victorian England. It also had a plot that was entertaining. However, I didn't find the narration very convincing and at times irritating. The characterisation was poor and at times, distractingly so. I might look at another book in the series but not if it has the same narrator. I'm sure the narrator is a talented actor, I think he's wrongly chosen for this book.

Entertaining enough to make me want to finish

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Main character is too 'saintly and knowing ' to the point of irritation. and the main motive for the villian is quite silly really.

fine performance, weak story

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I struggled with this story as it's so predictable. It plodding pace is as if a slow train is just rumbling along for the sake of it. The narrator has a talent to present the storyline in many different voices, however his storytelling I found less than engaging.

A predictable story

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This was well crafted detective story set in the Victorian era, and for once it was a story without a twist ending. Thank you.

Well crafted detective story

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its OK, not a bad story sadly spoiled by bad narration. luckily looks like the rest are read by somebody else so might try the next one.

its ok

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Listen to 2nd story on my digital Library app, because I was intrigued by the fact it was about crimes happening in trains in the age of steam trains & I love steam trains.
I enjoyed that, but they didn't have the 1st book, so I got this on audible & it was worth it, I alway said I didn't what to read detective stories which I took had the adult version of a adventure stories I loved has A kid (like the Enid Blyton Adventure series), because I didn't want to read about Murder etc, then I found this series of books and I haven't looked back.
Though once I forgot this was set in Victorian times and got excited when he said about getting a steam train, trying to think what line he could be using & how come that's quicker than a cab, then I remembered I wasn't in my time & that cab is a horse drawn covered vehicle not a taxi & that all trains were steam 😂. Trouble is I keep picturing the steam trains of 20th century has that's that's what I many seen, so it's a bit of a eye opener with trains of the mid 19th century, so we a little further on than the rocket, though not much, which these audio books came with pictures 😂)

Never thought I'd enjoy a detective story,

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This was hard work. Completely the wrong narrator for this type of book and it felt most characters were the same, it made me disinterested but I pushed myself to finish reading it. Some of the writing skills need sharpening but the story is interesting.

Wrong Narrator

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Immediately disliked the narration intensely and had to up the speed! As others have said, the story was pretty predictable and some of it felt quite lazily written.

‘Ok’

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