The Datchet Diamonds

By Richard Marsh

This early work by Richard Marsh was originally published in 1898 and we are now republishing it with a brand new introductory biography. A cautionary tale of Cyril Paxton - a gambler who has lost his last bet. Accidentally finding himself with of a quarter million pounds worth of stolen diamonds, the story quickly leads to his involvement with Scotland Yard's finest. Richard Bernard Heldmann – better-known by his pseudonym, Richard Marsh – was born in England in 1857. A best-selling and prolific author of the late 19th century and the Edwardian period, Marsh is best known now for his supernatural thriller novel The Beetle, which was published the same year as Bram Stoker's Dracula (1897). Richard Marsh was a versatile writer of ghost stories, horror novels, and romances, as well as thrilling mysteries like The Datchet Diamonds - which is considered to be one of the earliest modern detective novels.

• Language: English
• Publisher: White Press
• Release date: Dec 10, 2014
• ISBN: 9781473398542

Richard Marsh

Richard Marsh (1857-1915) was the pseudonym of bestselling English author Richard Bernard Heldmann. Born in North London to Jewish parents, he began publishing adventure stories for boys in 1880. He soon found work as co-editor of Union Jack, a weekly boy’s magazine, but this arrangement ended by June 1883 with his arrest for cheque forgery. Sentenced to eighteen months of hard labor, Heldmann emerged from prison and began using his pseudonym by 1888. The Beetle (1897), his most commercially successful work, is a classic of the horror genre that draws on the tradition of the sensation novel to investigate such concerns of late-Victorian England as poverty, the New Woman, homosexuality, and empire. Published the same year as Bram Stoker’s Dracula, The Beetle was initially far more popular and sold out on its first printing almost immediately. His other works, though less successful, include The Goddess: A Demon (1900) and A Spoiler of Men (1905), both pioneering works of horror and science fiction. A prolific short story writer, he was published in Cornhill Magazine, The Strand Magazine, and Belgravia.