The Vanishing Man (Illustrated)

“Freeman should not be overlooked. After all, his Dr. John Thorndyke is the forerunner of all those CSI and forensic investigators that we read about today in mystery novels and binge watch on TV. A quick, witty read -- with new illustrations.”
- Hollis George, editor and bibliophile

This is the second Dr. Thorndyke novel, published in England as The Eye of Osiris in England. The titular “vanishing man” is wealthy old John Bellingham, a collector of Egyptian antiquities, who has disappeared without a trace. Thorndyke gets involved to protect a friend from being wrongly charged with murder.

Richard Austin Freeman is a British writer known for his detective stories featuring the forensic investigator Dr. John Thorndyke. Trained as a doctor, Freeman joined the Colonial Service wherein he was stationed on the Gold Coast of Africa. Contracting blackwater fever, he returned to London and began writing fiction. He is credited with inventing the Inverted Detective Story, where the crime and perpetrator are revealed in the beginning and the book describes the investigator’s process in solving the mystery.