Book Forger

Regular price €17.50
Quantity:
In stock with our UK publisher. 14-28 days
Delivery/Collection within 10-20 working days
14 days return policy Shipping & Delivery
A01=Joseph Hone
arthur conan doyle
astonishing
Author_Joseph Hone
based on a true story
ben mcintyre
benjamin myers
biography
book history
bookish
british history
can you ever forgive me
Category=ABK
Category=DSBH
Category=JKVM
Category=KNTP1
Category=NHTB
comic
cosy crime
counterfeit
crime fiction
detective story
dorothy sayers
emma smith
eq_art-fashion-photography
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_business-finance-law
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
espionage
fakers
forgery
funny
hallie rubenhold
historical crime
ian fleming
james bond
janice hallett
john le carre
language
literary
memoir
modern history
moriarty
mystery
real life
richard osman
sherlock
sherlock holmes
shocking
spies
spy
susie dent
the gallows pole
true crime
twentieth century
words

Product details

  • ISBN 9781529931440
  • Weight: 236g
  • Dimensions: 129 x 196mm
  • Publication Date: 07 Aug 2025
  • Publisher: Vintage Publishing
  • Publication City/Country: GB
  • Product Form: Paperback
Secure checkout Fast Shipping Easy returns

‘A page-turner about page-turners’ Janice Hallett
‘The perfect piece of armchair detection’ Ruth Ware
‘Hugely entertaining and unexpectedly gripping’ London Review of Books


A true detective story from the age of Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers: the literary crime that fooled the world - and the daring young booksellers who uncovered it

London, 1932. Thomas James Wise is the toast of the literary establishment. A prominent collector and businessman, with friends in high places, he is one of the most powerful men in the field of rare books.

One night, two young booksellers stumble upon a strange discrepancy leading them to suspect Wise and his books are not all they seem. Inspired by the vogue for Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes, the pair harness the latest developments in forensic analysis to crack the case. By the time they are done, their investigation will have rocked the book world to its core.

‘A thrilling unravelling of bookish fraud that reads like a detective story from the golden age’ Roland Philipps, author of A Spy Named Orphan

‘Hone is a lively and fluent writer, ratcheting up the temperature with snappy sentences and chapters ending on cliffhangers’ Sunday Telegraph

Joseph Hone is a prize-winning writer and academic specialising in the history of the book. He studied and taught at Oxford, before holding fellowships at Cambridge, Harvard, and Yale. He is the author of The Paper Chase, which was longlisted for the HWA Non-Fiction Crown, and The Book Forger, publishing in 2024. In 2022 he was awarded the Philip Leverhulme Prize in Languages and Literatures. He lives in Newcastle with his wife and son, and spends much of his time either on the coast or scrabbling around in second-hand bookshops.

More from this author