Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) was a British writer, philosopher, lay theologian, and literary critic. Chesterton wrote around 80 books, several hundred poems, some 200 short stories, several plays, plus 4,000 essays and newspaper columns. He was a columnist for the Daily News and The Illustrated London News.

Shabby and lumbering, with a face like a Norfolk dumpling, Father Brown makes for an improbable super-sleuth. But his innocence is the secret of his success: refusing the scientific method of detection, he adopts instead an approach of simple sympathy, interpreting each crime as a work of art, and each criminal as a man no worse than himself… Here you will find the complete Father Brown stories in the chronological order of their original publication. The Innocence of Father Brown Starts at Chapter 1, The Wisdom of Father Brown Starts at Chapter 13.

Written by G. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy addresses foremost one main problem: How can we contrive to be at once astonished at the world and yet at home in it? Chesterton writes, "I wish to set forth my faith as particularly answering this double spiritual need, the need for that mixture of the familiar and the unfamiliar which Christendom has rightly named romance."

In The Napoleon of Notting Hill, his first novel, G. K. Chesterton creates a witty satire of staid government, set in a London of the future. Auberon Quinn, a common clerk who looks like a cross between a baby and an owl and is often seen standing on his head, is one day told that he has been randomly selected to be His Majesty the King. He decides to turn London into a medieval carnival for his own amusement - with delightful results.

Chesterton's compilation of essays in Heretics discusses the difference in Orthodoxy and Heretics, rational vs. irrational, and denial vs. affirmation. He questions the reason for the existence of man and the universe and calls out many prominent figures in the artistic and literary fields for their unorthodox ideas; thus labeling them heretics. He will have you thinking of favorite authors like Rudyard Kipling, Oscar Wilde, and H.G. Wells in a new light, challenging their ideals and morals.

This classic novel by the brilliant G. K. Chesterton tells the rollicking tale of Innocent Smith, a man who may be crazy - or possibly the most sane man of all. Arriving at a dreary London boarding house accompanied by a windstorm, Smith is an exuberant, eccentric, and sweet-natured man. Smith has a positive effect on the house - he creates his own court, brings a few couples together, and falls in love with a paid companion next door. All seems to be well with the world.

In this important book, G.K. Chesterton offers a remarkably perceptive analysis of social and moral issues, even more relevant today than in his own time. With a light, humorous tone but a deadly serious philosophy, he comments on errors in education, on feminism vs. true womanhood, on the importance of the child, and other issues, using incisive arguments against the trendsetters’ assaults on the common man and the family.

These four stories test Father Brown in many ways, creating headaches a plenty. However, Father Brown is nothing if not redoubtable and whilst Chesterton's stories are, in his own words, "very slight and improbable", his method is all his own. Bill Wallis captures perfectly the mood and tone of Father Brown in this collection.

Few people had a more profound effect on Christianity in the 20th century than G. K. Chesterton. The Everlasting Man, written in response to an anti-Christian history of humans penned by H.G. Wells, is considered Chesterton’s masterpiece. In it, he explains Christ’s place in history, asserting that the Christian myth carries more weight than other mythologies for one simple reason—it is the truth.

This audiobook is wonderfully narrated by British actor Nigel Peever, who brings the story to life. Published by Chesterton Books.

Secular humanism has triumphed. Everything the late Victorians and Edwardians believed would bring human happiness has been achieved: Technology has made it so no one needs to work for a living, the social sciences ensure a smooth-running social order, and, in the name of tolerance, religious beliefs have been uprooted and eliminated except for a single holdout - a largely discredited and rapidly shrinking Catholic Church. Yet people are unhappy.

Colorful Christmas lights dapple the family homes in the idyllic lakeside town of Sweet Haven when Jennifer Dean, a young librarian at the local elementary school, is brutally murdered. There are witnesses and her boyfriend Travis Blake confesses to the crime...but something doesn't quite add up. Blake is a third generation Army Ranger, awarded the Silver Star for his heroism in Afghanistan - how could a beloved son of this tight-knit burgh commit such a grisly deed?

Ever since he made his first appearance in A Study In Scarlet, Sherlock Holmes has enthralled and delighted millions of fans throughout the world. Now Audible is proud to present Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, read by Stephen Fry. A lifelong fan of Doyle's detective fiction, Fry has narrated the definitive collection of Sherlock Holmes - four novels and four collections of short stories. And, exclusively for Audible, Stephen has written and narrated eight insightful introductions, one for each title.

John Milton's Paradise Lost is one of the greatest epic poems in the English language. It tells the story of the Fall of Man, a tale of immense drama and excitement, of rebellion and treachery, of innocence pitted against corruption, in which God and Satan fight a bitter battle for control of mankind's destiny.

'Leaf by Niggle' recounts the strange adventures of the painter Niggle, who sets out to paint the perfect tree. But he senses that he will be snatched away from his work long before it is finished - if indeed it could ever be finished in this world. For it is in another and brighter place that Niggle finds his tree is finished and learns that it is indeed a real tree, a true part of creation.

In The Napoleon of Notting Hill, his first novel, G. K. Chesterton creates a witty satire of staid government, set in a London of the future. Auberon Quinn, a common clerk who looks like a cross between a baby and an owl and is often seen standing on his head, is one day told that he has been randomly selected to be His Majesty the King. He decides to turn London into a medieval carnival for his own amusement - with delightful results.

This audiobook is wonderfully narrated by British actor Nigel Peever, who brings the story to life. Published by Chesterton Books.

Maurice Leblanc, a writer of detective fiction during the same period as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, created Arsene Lupin, a sort of French Robin Hood. An inventive genius, a master of disguise, and an accomplished actor, Lupin operates in the choice chateaux and salons. He scorns sham and with great disdain leaves his card in a baron's residence. The card reads, "Arsene Lupin, gentleman-burglar, will return when the furniture is genuine."

In what many refer to as one of the first and greatest science fiction thrillers, a mysterious stranger wanders into an inn, wrapped head-to-toe in bandages. What lies beneath the bandages is something even more mysterious. As Wells tackles issues of identity, deception, and the deterioration of the human mind, listeners will be drawn into the story of the mysterious man, whose own mistakes end up whisking him into a whirlwind of deceit, terror, and even murder. In the end, the question will be asked: when your sense of self and identity vanish, who will you become?

Sartre's greatest novel and existentialism's key text, now introduced by James Wood, and read by the inimitable Edoardo Ballerini. Nausea is the story of Antoine Roquentin, a French writer who is horrified at his own existence. In impressionistic, diary form, he ruthlessly catalogs his every feeling and sensation.

Edgar Allan Poe, the master of terror, wrote some of literature's most entertaining and influential short stories, works that invented or anticipated modern detective novels, science fiction, and the horror genre. Tales of Terror collects nine of Poe's best-loved stories, all performed in chilling, highly dramatic readings by Jack Foreman. This collection includes such classics as "The Tell-Tale Heart", "The Pit and the Pendulum", "The Fall of the House of Usher", and what many consider his masterpiece, "The Murders in the Rue Morgue."

Grigori Aleksandrovich Pechorin is an enigma: arrogant, cocky, melancholic, brave, cynic, romantic, loner, socialite, soldier, free soul, and yet, victim of the world, he eludes definition and remains a mystery to those who know him. Just who is he? And what does he hope to achieve? Evolving from first person to third person, and then into a diary, A Hero of Our Time takes on a variety of forms to interrogate Pechorin's cryptic character and his unusual philosophy, providing breathtaking descriptions of the Caucasus along the way.

When George Abbershaw is invited to Black Dudley Manor for the weekend, he has only one thing on his mind - proposing to Meggie Oliphant. Unfortunately for George, things don't quite go according to plan. A harmless game turns decidedly deadly and suspicions of murder take precedence over matrimony. Trapped in a remote country house with a murderer, George can see no way out. But Albert Campion can.

Flann O'Brien's most popular and surrealistic novel concerns an imaginary, hellish village police force and a local murder.

Weird, satirical, and very funny, its popularity has suddenly increased with the mention of the novel in the TV series Lost.

H. P. Lovecraft is arguably the most important horror writer of the 20th century. Culled from his 1927 essay "Supernatural Horror in Literature”, Lovecraft acknowledges those authors and stories that he feels are the very finest the horror field has to offer, including Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, Henry James, Rudyard Kipling, Bram Stoker, Robert Louis Stevenson, Guy de Maupassant, Ambrose Bierce, and Arthur Conan Doyle. This chilling collection includes 20 works, each prefaced by Lovecraft's own opinions and insights in each author’s work.

A stunningly beautiful youth and the city of Venice set the stage for Thomas Mann’s introspective examination of erotic love and philosophical wisdom.

A wildly comic send-up of Irish literature and culture, At Swim-Two-Birds is the story of a young, lazy, and frequently drunk Irish college student who lives with his curmudgeonly uncle in Dublin. When not in bed (where he seems to spend most of his time) or reading, he is composing a mischief-filled novel about Dermot Trellis, a second-rate author whose characters ultimately rebel against him and seek vengeance. From drugging him as he sleeps to dropping the ceiling on his head, these figures of Irish myth make Trellis pay dearly for his bad writing.

In the year 1792, Sir Percy and Lady Marguerite Blakeney are the darlings of British society---he is known as one of the wealthiest men in England and a dimwit; she is French, a stunning former actress, and "the cleverest woman in Europe"---and they find themselves at the center of a deadly political intrigue.

From one of the greatest modern writers in world literature comes a magnificent story of love, adventure, and rescue played out against the shimmering South Seas. Alone on a tropical island, a Swedish baron and a beautiful violinist discover the long-lost joys of love. But when two treasure hunters arrive on the beach, the lovers know that evil has invaded their romantic paradise—an evil they are powerless to stop.

Inspector Nayland Smith has unearthed a plot that could mean the end of civilization as we know it. He's just arrived in London, chasing the greatest criminal mind ever to come from the East. But when he arrives to warn Sir Crichton Davies that he is in danger, he finds he is too late. Sir Crichton has become the first victim of the insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu.

This audiobook is wonderfully narrated by British actor Nigel Peever, who brings the story to life. Published by Chesterton Books.

Eight Stories from “The Innocence of Father Brown” in which the affable Norfolk Priest uses his insight into human nature and eccentricity to solve the seemingly unsolveable.

Few people had a more profound effect on Christianity in the 20th century than G. K. Chesterton. The Everlasting Man, written in response to an anti-Christian history of humans penned by H.G. Wells, is considered Chesterton’s masterpiece. In it, he explains Christ’s place in history, asserting that the Christian myth carries more weight than other mythologies for one simple reason—it is the truth.

Chesterton's talent as a mystery writer is displayed in this collection of detective stories, The Man Who Knew Too Much. In each story, the star detective, Horne Fisher, deals with another strange mystery: the vanishing of a priceless coin, the framing of an Irish "prince" freedom fighter, an eccentric rich man dies during an obsessive fishing trip, another vanishing during an ice skate, a statue crushing his own uncle, and a few more.

"Nothing more strangely indicates an enormous and silent evil of modern society than the extraordinary use which is made nowadays of the word orthodox. In former days the heretic was proud of not being a heretic. It was the kingdoms of the world and the police and the judges who were heretics. He was orthodox. He had no pride in having rebelled against them; they had rebelled against him. The armies with their cruel security, the kings with their cold faces, the decorous processes of State, the reasonable processes of law - all these like sheep had gone astray...."

A serious attack against Christianity by well-known newspaper editor Robert Blatchford in 1903 impelled Chesterton to seize the gauntlet of refutation. His reply was immensely successful and was the early formation of his convincing credo that is so brilliantly and cogently argued in Orthodoxy, a masterwork that was published just five years later.

Saint Francis of Assisi is one of the most influential men in the whole of human history. This acclaimed biography of Saint Francis examines the life of a pure artist, a man "whose whole life was a poem". Here is the Saint Francis who prayed and danced with pagan abandon, who talked to animals, and who invented the crèche. Yet Francis also acknowledged the mystic responsibility to communicate his divine experience.

Dubbed the "Dumb Ox" by his classmates for his shyness, Saint Thomas Aquinas proved to be possessed of the rarest brilliance, justifying the faith of his teacher, Albertus Magnus, and sparking a revolution in Christian thought. Chesterton's unsurpassed examination of Aquinas' thinking makes his philosophy accessible to listeners of any generation.

Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) was a British writer, philosopher, lay theologian, and literary critic. Chesterton wrote around 80 books, several hundred poems, some 200 short stories, several plays, plus 4,000 essays and newspaper columns. He was a columnist for the Daily News and The Illustrated London News.

You may be aware that G. K. Chesterton authored influential Christian biographies and apologetics. But you may not know the larger-than-life Gilbert Keith Chesterton himself - not yet. Equally versed in poetry, novels, literary criticism, and journalism, he addressed politics, culture, and religion with a towering intellect and a soaring wit. Chesterton carried on lively, public discussions with the social commentators of his day, continually challenging them with civility, humility, erudition, and his ever-sharp sense of humor.

Considered by many to be one of G.K. Chesterton’s greatest works, The Everlasting Man (first published in 1925), along with many of Chesterton’s other works, were heavily influenced by his own spiritual journey into Christianity. Published in 1925, The Everlasting Man is said to be a rebuttal of H.G. Wells’ The Outline of History, in which Chesterton delves into the history of religion and the spiritual exploration of Western society while defending any objections to Christianity.