The Great Train Robbery

$12.99 US
Knopf | Vintage
On sale May 14, 2012 | 978-0-307-81644-3
Sales rights: US, Canada, Open Mkt
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Jurassic Park comes classic historical thriller about Victorian London’s most notorious gold heist.

London, 1855, when lavish wealth and appalling poverty exist side by side, one mysterious man navigates both worlds with perfect ease. Edward Pierce preys on the most prominent of the well-to-do as he cunningly orchestrates the crime of his century. Who would suspect that a gentleman of breeding could mastermind the extraordinary robbery aboard the pride of England’s industrial era, the mighty steam locomotive? Based on fact, but studded with all the suspense and style of fiction, here is a classic historical thriller, set a decade before the age of dynamite—yet nonetheless explosive…
“A nineteenth-century version of The Sting…. Crichton fascinates us.” —The New York Times Book Review
 
“A work of intelligence and craftsmanship…. Written with grace and wit.” —Los Angeles Times

“One of the great storytellers of our age.... The best Michael Crichton novels are ... edifying reads, whose gripping plots contain real ideas.” —Newsday

“Crichton is a master at blending edge-of-the-chair adventure and a scientific seminar, educating his readers as he entertains them.” —Chicago Sun-Times

“[Crichton] makes the unbelievable believable.” —Washington Post

“[Crichton’s] stories are always page-turners of the highest order.” —The Denver Post

About

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Jurassic Park comes classic historical thriller about Victorian London’s most notorious gold heist.

London, 1855, when lavish wealth and appalling poverty exist side by side, one mysterious man navigates both worlds with perfect ease. Edward Pierce preys on the most prominent of the well-to-do as he cunningly orchestrates the crime of his century. Who would suspect that a gentleman of breeding could mastermind the extraordinary robbery aboard the pride of England’s industrial era, the mighty steam locomotive? Based on fact, but studded with all the suspense and style of fiction, here is a classic historical thriller, set a decade before the age of dynamite—yet nonetheless explosive…

Praise

“A nineteenth-century version of The Sting…. Crichton fascinates us.” —The New York Times Book Review
 
“A work of intelligence and craftsmanship…. Written with grace and wit.” —Los Angeles Times

“One of the great storytellers of our age.... The best Michael Crichton novels are ... edifying reads, whose gripping plots contain real ideas.” —Newsday

“Crichton is a master at blending edge-of-the-chair adventure and a scientific seminar, educating his readers as he entertains them.” —Chicago Sun-Times

“[Crichton] makes the unbelievable believable.” —Washington Post

“[Crichton’s] stories are always page-turners of the highest order.” —The Denver Post