The Printer, the Spymaster, and the Hunt for the Rebel Pamphleteers

The Paper Chase

A terrific adventure story from the age of Queen Anne – with all the pace and brio of a novel

A remarkable achievement...a fast-paced, captivating narrative... Hone demonstrates how uncovering 18th-century working lives can be every bit as enthralling as tracing the machinations of the greatest politicians of the age

An exciting story told with vigour... A fascinating insight into the world of late Stuart printing... [Hone] manages to combine a lively, almost novelistic narrative style with a confident and scholarly knowledge of his subject

An elegant blend of scholarship and detection that reanimates the dangerous, exciting, clandestine world of Fleet Street at the start of the modern age

A brilliantly original, immersive and thrilling tale told by a fine scholar and storyteller

Jessie Childs, author of God’s Traitors

Enthralling microhistory...provides in Hone's skilled hands the clearest view to date of the murky world of underground printing in late Stuart London

Longlisted for the HWA Non-Fiction Crown 
 
'A remarkable achievement' Spectator 
 
In the summer of 1705, a masked woman knocked on the door of a London printer's workshop. She did not leave her name, only a package and the promise of protection. 
 
Soon after, an anonymous pamphlet was quietly distributed in the backstreets of the city. Entitled The Memorial of the Church of England, the argument it proposed threatened to topple the government. Fearing insurrection, parliament was in turmoil and government minister Robert Harley launched a hunt for all of those involved. The printer was eventually named, but could not be found... 
 
In this breakneck political adventure, Joseph Hone shows us a nation in crisis through the story of a single incendiary document. 
 
'An elegant blend of scholarship and detection' Peter Moore, author of Endeavour 
'Enthralling' London Review of Books 
'An exciting story told with vigour' Adrian Tinniswood, Literary Review

Joseph Hone

'This is an absolutely fascinating literary detective story. Real-life audacious crimes uncovered by the most intrepid amateur detectives, investigated all over again a hundred years later here, in delicious forensic detail, by Joseph Hone. A must-read for anyone enthralled by the value and integrity of books. A page turner about page turners'

Janice Hallett, author of The Alperton Angels

'I loved this elegant untangling of a real-life literary mystery. With a cast stretching from Robert Browning to Dorothy L Sayers, it's the perfect piece of armchair detection for any book lover'

Ruth Ware, author of The Woman in Cabin 10

'Joseph Hone’s hugely entertaining new account shows how this ‘Moriarty of the book world’ met his match in a duo of intrepid young book dealers ... The Book Forger unfolds as a propulsive if unlikely thriller [and] also a useful reflection on literary forgery in general, which speaks to our own era of post-truth and deepfakes ... Unexpectedly gripping'

Hone&hellip; [is] a dexterous guide and an astute contributor to the long tradition of writers gripped by the connection between bibliography and crime

'An extraordinary story, meticulously researched and beautifully written. Utterly enthralling'

Shaun Bythell, author of The Diary of a Bookseller

Hone is a lively and fluent writer, ratcheting up the temperature with snappy sentences and chapters ending on cliffhangers

&lsquo;A thrilling unravelling of bookish fraud that reads like a detective story from the golden age&rsquo;

Roland Philipps, author of A SPY NAMED ORPHAN

Fascinating&hellip; For all the thrills and shenanigans, the forensics and meticulous detail, this is a curiously moving book

'Criminally sophisticated skulduggery . . . A thoroughly enjoyable romp through an infamous moment in book history&rsquo;

Oliver Darkshire, author of ONCE UPON A TOME

Meticulously researched&hellip; The Book Forger is delightfully and unapologetically bookish, offering glimpsed portraits of significant behind-the-scenes literary figures

&lsquo;Spies, detectives, forgers, and The Case of the Kernless 'f'. Another superb piece of narrative scholarship from the best storyteller in book history&rsquo;

Dennis Duncan, author of INDEX: A HISTORY OF THE

'Intriguing, well-written, and impressively researched, The Book Forger tells a great story that is truly stranger than fiction'

Martin Edwards, President of the Detection Club

This book has a great story to tell…and Joseph Hone narrates it brilliantly… Hone makes a page-turning narrative of their detective work

The true story of a literary crime that fooled the world

London, 1932. Thomas James Wise is the toast of the literary establishment. A prominent collector and businessman, he is renowned on both sides of the Atlantic for unearthing the most stunning first editions and bringing them to market. Pompous and fearsome, with friends in high places, he is one of the most powerful men in the field of rare books. 
 
One night, two young booksellers - one a dishevelled former communist, the other a martini-swilling fan of detective stories - stumble upon a strange discrepancy. It will lead them to suspect Wise and his books are not all they seem. Inspired by the vogue for Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes, the pair harness the latest developments in forensic analysis to crack the case, but find its extent is greater than they ever could have imagined. By the time they are done, their investigation will have rocked the book world to its core. 
 
This is the true story of unlikely friends coming together to expose the literary crime of the century, and of a maverick bibliophile who forged not only books but an entire life, erasing his past along the way.

Joseph Hone

Praise for The Book Forger

'This is an absolutely fascinating literary detective story. Real-life audacious crimes uncovered by the most intrepid amateur detectives, investigated all over again a hundred years later here, in ...

'I loved this elegant untangling of a real-life literary mystery. With a cast stretching from Robert Browning to Dorothy L Sayers, it's the perfect piece of armchair detection for any book lover'

'Joseph Hone’s hugely entertaining new account shows how this ‘Moriarty of the book world’ met his match in a duo of intrepid young book dealers ... The Book Forger unfolds as a propulsive if ...

'This is an absolutely fascinating literary detective story. Real-life audacious crimes uncovered by the most intrepid amateur detectives, investigated all over again a hundred years later here, in ...

'I loved this elegant untangling of a real-life literary mystery. With a cast stretching from Robert Browning to Dorothy L Sayers, it's the perfect piece of armchair detection for any book lover'

'Joseph Hone’s hugely entertaining new account shows how this ‘Moriarty of the book world’ met his match in a duo of intrepid young book dealers ... The Book Forger unfolds as a propulsive if ...

'This is an absolutely fascinating literary detective story. Real-life audacious crimes uncovered by the most intrepid amateur detectives, investigated all over again a hundred years later here, in ...

'I loved this elegant untangling of a real-life literary mystery. With a cast stretching from Robert Browning to Dorothy L Sayers, it's the perfect piece of armchair detection for any book lover'

'Joseph Hone’s hugely entertaining new account shows how this ‘Moriarty of the book world’ met his match in a duo of intrepid young book dealers ... The Book Forger unfolds as a propulsive if ...

Books by Joseph Hone

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