The Gold Trail

Bindloss, Harold, 1866-1945Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 2.8
Word count
588K words
Chapters
59

Tags

English Originals Fate and FortuneJianghu FeudHeroismHuman NatureWealth StoriesPopular NarrativeExotic Culture

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.The Gold Trail by Harold BindlossAuthor: Bindloss, Harold, 1866-1945,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Apr 23, 2007

Editor's review

The Gold Trail is an English-language novel by Harold Bindloss, made available as a free ebook by Project Gutenberg. Bindloss often set his work against wilderness, pioneering, and adventure, and this book follows that narrative bent: the plot advances through hazards encountered on the journey, the choices characters make, and secrets gradually revealed, with a brisk pace and a strong sense of scene. For readers curious about early twentieth-century popular English adventure fiction, it offers a highly readable sample: character motives are direct, conflicts are clear, and the environmental description serves the action rather than showing off technique. As a public-domain ebook, it suits reading in segments during a commute or a trip, and also works as English extensive reading material, using plot momentum to expand vocabulary. Note that the work carries narrative habits and attitudes of its time; today's readers would do well to read it with a critical eye rather than treat it as a reliable reference on history or geography.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Not a good fit for

Reading tips

  1. Move chapter by chapter, and at the end of each chapter retell the plot in two or three sentences to check comprehension and keep momentum
  2. Mark unfamiliar period expressions first and look them up together after finishing the chapter, so as to reduce interruptions
  3. Use a map or background material to understand the story's geographical setting and strengthen the sense of scene

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.

Contents

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16
  17. 17
  18. 18
  19. 19
  20. 20
  21. 21
  22. 22
  23. 23
  24. 24
  25. 25
  26. 26
  27. 27
  28. 28
  29. 29
  30. 30
  31. 31
  32. 32
  33. 33
  34. 34
  35. 35
  36. 36
  37. 37
  38. 38
  39. 39
  40. 40
  41. 41
  42. 42
  43. 43
  44. 44
  45. 45
  46. 46
  47. 47
  48. 48
  49. 49
  50. 50
  51. 51
  52. 52
  53. 53
  54. 54
  55. 55
  56. 56
  57. 57
  58. 58
  59. 59

FAQ

Is this book suitable for English beginners? Not really for complete beginners or elementary learners. This is an early twentieth-century English novel whose sentence patterns and word choices carry period features; the plot is straightforward, but the vocabulary demand is not low. It suits readers with intermediate reading ability who can tolerate some unfamiliar words and are willing to infer from context. Beginners who want to try should read selected passages with a dictionary and a guide rather than plowing through from page one.
Is The Gold Trail a complete novel or a short story collection? According to the Project Gutenberg record, it is an English-language novel classified under English literature, not a short story collection. Readers should plan their time as they would for a novel, moving chapter by chapter, and should not expect each chapter to stand alone. The actual chapter divisions should follow the electronic text as presented; while reading, use the table of contents or bookmark function to manage progress.
What should I keep in mind when reading the free electronic edition? The Gutenberg edition is a public-domain electronic text prepared by volunteers, usually with project notes and copyright information at the beginning, and the main text may occasionally contain typesetting or scanning remnants. While reading, you can skip the front matter and, when you encounter an obvious typo, judge it from context. A reading app with adjustable font size and bookmarks is recommended for segmented reading of a long work and for looking back.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Bindloss, Harold, 1866-1945 Author

Harold Bindloss (1866–1945) was an English-language writer active from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century; public information about the details of his life is limited. The library holds 43 of his works, mostly novels, including Hawtrey's Deputy, Blake's Burden, For Jacinta, The Mistress of Bonaventure, The Greater Power, For the Allinson Honor, The Long Portage, and By Right of Purchase. Judging from these titles and their number, he was a prolific author of popular fiction for general readers, with themes often involving adventure, honor, duty, and life overseas. Because systematic biographical sources are lacking, his nationality, education, and specific experiences cannot be confirmed at present; assessments of his style and literary influence should also be further examined in light of more editions and reviews.