The Thirty-nine steps

By John Buchan

This week's reading challenge was to tackle a classic. 'Classic' is defined as a book more than 50 years old. I think it safe to say 1915 is more than 50 years old. I loved this book, though the language in it is quick tricky to follow in places, especially as Buchan attempts to write in a Scottish accent.
I often feel I was born in the wrong era, I think I would have liked to have 'had dinner at the club' or 'sat in the reading room with the paper'. It's certainly a romantic notion of mine.

I much prefer Buchan's writing to Joesph Conrad's Secret Agent. It has a better momentum to it. But don't know if that is more to do with the authors' writing style or the reader's lack of book-learning.

Synopsis

When Richard Hannay returns from a long stay in Africa, he becomes caught up in a sensational plot to precipitate a pan-European war.
After the discovery of a corpse in his flat, Hannay flees the attentions of both the conspirators and the forces of the law, and the pursuit turns into a thrilling manhunt.
Set against the hot summer which precedes the outbreak of the First World War. The Thirty-nine Steps is one of the finest and most highly admired thrillers ever written.

Author 

After a brief legal career, Buchan simultaneously began his writing career and his political and diplomatic careers, serving as a private secretary to the colonial administrator of various colonies in southern Africa. He eventually wrote propaganda for the British war effort in the First World War. Buchan was in 1927 elected Member of Parliament for the Combined Scottish Universities.

(Wikipedia)

Other novels

Prester John (1910)
The 39 Steps - Richard Hannay, #1 (1915)
Greenmantle - Richard Hannay #2 (1916)
Mr. Standfast - Richard Hannay #3 (1919)
The Three Hostages - Richard Hannay #4 (1924)
The Island of Sheep - Richard Hannay #5 (1936)