Memoirs of Vidocq: Master of Crime, by Francis Eugene Vidoq, translated by Edwin Gile
It’s hard to believe this hasn’t been on audio before.
Get ready for a revelation: Vidocq was an 18th century master thief, who so bedeviled the French police that they eventually begged him to become their Master Detective, turning the tables on crime. He founded the Sûreté Nationale as well as creating the FIRST private detective agency, He is indeed the Father of modern criminology!
Arthur Conan Doyle said that Vidocq directly inspired him to write his Sherlock Holmes series.
Vidocq's memoir, literally, is the first police procedural novel-- and it’s still mesmerizing.
Like Sherlock Holmes, Vidocq had no special technology or advanced science to solve his crimes or set criminal traps-- only his wits and knowledge of the criminal mind.
Like Holmes, he was, perhaps, a sociopath. He had no interests except in The Game.
Mystery aficionados will FLIP when they find out who Vidocq was, and that his memoir is available.
Narrated by John Mawson who did such a magnificent job reading The Road to Ruins, a favorite of ours.
--Susie Bright