This collection of Ernest Bramah's detective stories features a very special protagonist: Max Carrodos, the very first blind detective in literature. Bramah started publishing Max Carrodos stories in 1914 in Strand Magazine alongside Sherlock Holmes stories, some of the short stories being even more successful that the ones featuring Conan Doyle's well-known character.This book includes four of the most popular Carrodos stories. The first one, The Coin of Dionysius is the very first of all Carrodos-stories and it introduces the character of Max Carrodos, his eccentricities, his methods and his partner, Mr. Carlyle, a private detective who runs his own agency and revolves around the investigation of a supposed forgery of a valuable Sicilian coin; the second story, entitled The Knight's Cross Signal Problem, is about an Indian officer threatening to cause a train crash; the third tale, The Tragedy at Brookbend Cottage, is about a man who wants to kill his wife, while the fourth short story revolves around a mysterious bank robbery.Bramah lived a withdrawn life and very little is known about his private life, so all that is known about him concerns his persona as a writer. Whatever he wrote, whatever topic he expressed his opinion about, he was always considered to be the best - his detective fiction measured up to Conan Doyle, his political writings are often compared to H. G. Wells, his humorous writings match the quality of Jerome K. Jerome's sketches and novels, and some of his works influenced the greatest writers of our times, including John Orwell. His debut in the world of fictional writing was The Wallet of Kai Lung, a collection of fantasy tales that feature a Chinese story teller, a character that appears in many of Bramah's later writings, but what brought the author fame and success was definitely the Carrodos stories.