Red Money

Fergus Hume (Fergusson Wright Hume)Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

2.8

Word count: 490K words
Chapters: 49

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Red Money by Fergus HumeAuthor: Hume, Fergus, 1859-1932,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Mar 14, 2005

Editor's review

Red Money is an English novel by Fergus Hume, available as a free eBook from Project Gutenberg. Hume was known for plot-driven popular fiction dense with suspense, and this book revolves around troubles set off by money, carrying the typical flavor of late Victorian popular fiction: fortunes are overturned by a sum of money, and secrets, misunderstandings, and schemes pile up layer upon layer. Its value lies mainly in storytelling and period atmosphere rather than literary depth; it suits readers who want a sense of late nineteenth-century English popular fiction or a light diversion. The original is in English, and its length and narrative pace are fairly friendly to modern readers, though its characterisation and reliance on coincidence bear the limitations of its time. Read it as genre fiction, attending to the construction of suspense and the money theme, without demanding intellectual weight.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Fans of English popular fiction who enjoy suspense and plot twists
Readers curious about late nineteenth-century British genre fiction
Those practising reading in English who want a fast-paced diversion
Readers interested in stories about money and fate

Not a good fit for

Readers seeking serious literary depth and complex characterisation
Readers who need a Chinese translation or find the English original difficult
Those who dislike coincidence-driven plots or find old-fashioned narration slow

Reading tips

Read the first few chapters to sort out the characters, then follow the suspense.
Notice how money drives the characters' choices; use this as a thread for discussion afterwards.
If reading for English practice, set a chapter goal each day and note new words and names.
After finishing, compare it with other popular fiction of the same period to see its plot formulas.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

What kind of novel is this?

It is late nineteenth-century English popular fiction, notable for suspense and plot twists, built around the troubles a sum of money brings to the characters. It values storytelling over literary experiment and is best read as genre fiction.

Is the English difficult?

It is a modern English novel overall, with sentence patterns more elaborate than contemporary English, but the narrative is driven mainly by plot. Anyone with university-level English reading ability can attempt it; use context to work out old-fashioned expressions.

Who is Fergus Hume, the author?

Fergus Hume (1859–1932) was a British-born writer known for popular fiction with intricate plots. He wrote for long periods in Australia and Britain, and this is one of his English novels.

Is it suitable as an introduction to reading English originals?

It can serve as an intermediate step. It is easier than the classics, but still has nineteenth-century vocabulary and syntax, so it is best attempted after some experience with originals, with a dictionary and chapter notes at hand.

Comments

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About the author

Fergus Hume (Fergusson Wright Hume) Author · English · 1859–1932

Fergus Hume (1859–1932) was a British novelist. Born in England, he moved with his family to New Zealand as a child, studied at the University of Otago and qualified as a lawyer. In 1885 he went to Melbourne, and the following year he published The Mystery of a Hansom Cab at his own expense, achieving instant fame; the book is regarded as a bestselling classic in the history of detective fiction. In 1888 Hume returned to England to settle, and thereafter devoted himself to detective and suspense fiction, producing more than a hundred works in his lifetime, of which 66 are held in this collection, including The Silent House, The Gentleman Who Vanished and The Spider. He died in Essex in 1932.