The Minerva Club

Name: The Minerva Club
Rating: 4.1 (177 reviews)

by Victor Canning Book 8 in the Classic Canning series.

First published 2020

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4.0(177)

The Minerva Club is a discreet London institution whose membership is restricted to men with substantial criminal records. Within its respectable rooms, experienced thieves and confidence tricksters exchange ideas, plan ventures and apply professional pride to problems that ordinary clubs would never discuss. Their schemes involve hidden jewels, improvised burglaries, police pursuit and even the urgent acquisition of a wedding cake.

This Farrago volume gathers five linked stories originally written during Canning’s post-war career. The members are criminals, but the emphasis is on ingenuity, companionship and the unexpected human weakness that disrupts a perfect plan. The stories use the conventions of the gentlemen’s club and the classic crime caper to preserve a humorous view of mid-twentieth-century London, where old institutions and modern illegality coexist behind the same polished façade.