Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was born in Edinburgh on the 13 November 1850. His father and grandfather were both successful engineers who built many of the lighthouses that dotted the Scottish coast, whilst his mother came from a family of lawyers and church ministers. A sickly boy whose mother was also often unwell, Stevenson spent much of his childhood with the family nurse, Alison Cunningham. She told him many ghost stories and supernatural tales which seem to resonate throughout Stevenson's later fiction, reappearing in several of his short stories. The Suicide Club is a collection of three 19th century detective fiction short stories that combine to form a single narrative. The larger plot concerns the work of the hero, Prince Florizel of Bohemia, and his assistant, Colonel Geraldine, in pursuing and finally destroying the unnamed president of the Suicide Club, an organization that provides desperate men with ways to escape unhappy or disastrous lives without the scandal of overt self-destruction. Story of the Young Man with the Cream Tarts is the first story of The Suicide Club collection. The story is set in Victorian London, where Prince Florizel of Bohemia and Colonel Geraldine roam in search of adventure. They dine incognito in a London oyster bar where they are surprised to be accosted by a young man distributing cream tarts for free… Listen online to free English audiobook "Story of the Young Man with the Cream Tarts” on our website to experience Robert Louis Stevenson's work.
