Good Fiction about "trains" (recommendations)

A thread like this a few years back introduced me to The Wrecker by Clive Cussler.  Popcorn stuff and a good read.  I'm sure others will chime in.  50 Shades of Grey Union Pacific Tenders is on a night table somewhere...

Thanks POTRZBE,

I just download the first book in that Clive Cussler series, it's called "The Chase".

I've really enjoyed the Dirk Pitt books by Cussler, so I'm excited to give these a try!

Best...Rich

Highly recommend 'Night Probe' by Clive Cussler. It's one of the earlier Dirk Pitt novels.

Nick

Held For Orders - Frank Spearman - short story collection

The Nerve of Foley - Frank Spearman - short story collection

The Night Operator by Frank Packard - short story collection

Snow on the Headlight - Cy Warman - novel - Pullman strike

The General Managers Story - novel - first person life story - Herbert Hamblen

Give yourself some wonderful pre-Christmas reading by ordering a used copy ($4. which includes postage) from Amazon of "All Aboard for Christmas" by Christopher Jennison. Lots of stories and history about the "good old days" of train travel during the Christmas Holiday. I read my copy every year as a Christmas tradition.

Clive Cussler's Isaac (Spelling?)Bell series are set in the Early 1900's era and many of them include a lot of train scenes. In addition to "The Wrecker", "The Chase" had a lot of railroad action. I have read 5 or 6 of the Isaac Bell series books, and I can't remember any NOT having trains somewhere in the story, some more than others.

 In several books Isaac owns a Locomobile auto, I looked it up, and there really was a Locomobile automobile!. There are some things that were not 100% accurate, but still some very enjoyable reading.

Doug

Rich,

You could go to ebay category: "Railroadiana & Trains", then search "Railroad + Fiction". There are a lot of old railroad magazines with stories in them.

Well, there is always Murder on the Orient Express.  

And there are Edward Marston's The Railway Detective stories - one of the classics.  Published in England but some local bookstores (or internet bookstores) carry them.  There is a whole series.  Pretty good, but set back in the mid 19th century - Dickens time, sort of . . . 

Great recommendations, thanks all!

Best...Rich

If you want some very interesting reading that is NOT fiction (but reads like it), then consider the book by Gilbert Lathrop called "Little Engines and Big Men".  It's about Gilbert's uncles, Lewis and Carl, and their adventures during the years (and later) of the building of the Denver & Rio Grande narrow gauge lines in Colorado. Amazing life history of recollections. Carl, the younger brother, became a boomer, and even spent years on the Florence & Cripple Creek RR and the Colorado Midland RR. Lew began his railroad career in 1882 on the narrow gauge in Colorado, so you can imagine the railroading they faced.

Excellent book, AND... it was the real deal and not just good fiction.

Something else to think about.

There was a member that was giving away a book they had written about this time last year. I thought it was very good, though it was more about toy trains than real trains. Perhaps someone will chime in with who that was or what the name of the book was. I don't have my iPad handy to look for it at the moment.

There was also a book titled Christmasville that is about the figures in a Plasticville village under a Christmas tree that was pretty entertaining.

J White

"The Christmas Train" by David Baldacci

>Perhaps someone will chime in with who that was or what the name of the book was.<

That would be us, or at least Gabe and me  On Track for Christmas. We're working on a second volume of toy trains and one of the "real" railroad's...er...exploits. That's why I have to get the hobby shop built so we can do the cover photo.

I always loved to find an old Railroad Magazine to see if there was a short story that month. They were always really, really heavy on technical detail, but hey, they were good stories and they had plenty of trains.

Also, if you have anything to e-read on, there are some really good old railroad novels on Project Gutenberg. There are also some really awful ones! Freeman Hubbard edited a collection of short stories, the title of which escapes me at the moment, and those are all good.

--Becky

My favorite RR fiction book was "The Big Ivy" by James McCague.  I read it 60 years ago and it impressed me so much I still remember it.  It was turn of the century era story of life along the Indiana Valley RR, the "Big Ivy".  Some times in used book stores I find old 1940 era Railroad Magazines.  These always have great railroad based fiction stories.  For you youngsters (under age 55) the value of these old magazines is that you can learn what railroading was like in the pre diesel/pre computer days, days when lots more men were needed to run all the various railroads in those days.  Another good source of information is the letters to the editor and short reminiscences of old retired railroaders.  All the stuff helps give direction to your modelling and ideas for modelling a long past world from before your time.   Odd-d 

Becky, are you sure you don't mean Frank Donovan?  Hubbard edited The Phantom Brakeman and Other Railroad Stories and The Roundhouse Cat and Other Railroad Animals but these were both stories for kids.  He did, of course, edit Railroad Avenue but that is a compliation of real life events.

  Donovan, on the other hand, edited Headlights and Markers: An Anthology of Railroad Stories which is a collection for adults

I just pre-ordered (due 11/14) a book on Amazon "Great American Railroad Stories", the best from 75 years of a train magazine" for $18.75, as a Christmas gift to myself.

Joe, thanks for the heads up.  I did the same and, as luck would have it, the old Amazon You-Might-Like-Guy came up with a first person account which I did not know about so I got that one too.

"Murder on the Orient Express" by Agatha Christy.  

Opening up an old thread here to give an update!

Last year after I originally posted this I picked up these "old time" books and loved them all

- Held For Orders - Frank Spearman - short story collection

- The Nerve of Foley - Frank Spearman - short story collection

- The Night Operator by Frank Packard - short story collection

- Snow on the Headlight - Cy Warman - novel - Pullman strike

It looks like I missed "The General Managers Story" listed above, by Herbert Hamblen.  I think I either overlooked it or I got spooked off because of it's price tag (close to $30 used).

I also got spooked off "Little Engines and Big Men" because the price and availability.

I did downloaded/read the "rail" associated Clive Cussler books, they were all fun reads (The Chase, Night Probe, The Wrecker)

This past week I finally got around to again doing some train fiction reading, finishing off two books which I downloaded to the kindle:

"Murder on the Orient Express" by Agatha Christie

I loved it, really fun and while based "in a train" it really is a great story.

"On the Blue Comet" by Rosemary Wells

This was another really fun book to read.  The book is likely written for 10 year old kids, but I loved it, I guess we're all 10 years old at heart, right?  Lionel trains and layouts, a murder, just plain fun to read, I recommend it highly.

I'm currently reading "Train Travels Via Pullman 1950" by Richard H. Brown, only a couple pages in and it's pretty interesting so far, brings you back in time.

Next up on the kindle (already downloaded) are:

- "Lives of the Engineers The Locomotive" by George and Robert Stephenson.

- "The Christmas Train" by David Baldacci

I just ordered the following from Amazon (non kindle)

- The Christmasville Trilogy by Michael Dutton - Note: only the first two books have been published so far

- "All Aboard for Christmas"  by Christopher Jennison

- "Veranda Turbine: A Life" by Lee Willis (the forum member)

- "Great American Railroad Stories" 

I haven't yet looked into:

- Edward Marston's The Railway Detective stories

- "The Big Ivy" by James McCague

I've been digging around on "the bay" looking at the "Railroad Stories" pulp fiction books from the 1930s, but I'd actually like to read the stories and most of these books look like they will fall apart if I actually try to read them.

I haven't been able to find anything about "On Track for Christmas"

Thank you to all of you who commented and provided suggestions!

Best...Rich

I am kind of surprised "Train Man" by P. T. Deutermann hasn't been mentioned.  Fiction, but a fun read.

Just noticed something I miss-typed in my post above that I need to correct:

Lewis Lathrop was Gilbert Lathrop's FATHER, not uncle. Carl was the uncle.

Stupid fingers.

I would recommend the "Hook Runyon Mystery" series by Sheldon Russell which is set in the 1930's/1940's and has as its main character a railroad detective (yard dog) :

The Yard Dog

The Insane Train

Dead Man's Tunnel

The Hanging of Samuel Ash

While not fiction, but gives a great account of the history of American railroads and

their early days in being founded.  Do not recall the author, don't have it beside me,

but it is titled "Hear That Lonesome Whistle Blow".  It is very interesting reading and details behind the scenes goings-on with politics and special favors, along with other history.

Jesse 

I know some people may take issue with my recommendation, but I think it is a wonderful novel, albeit a bit long (>1000 pages) and involved:

"Atlas Shrugged", by Ayn Rand, which among other things, involves the Taggart Transcontinental railroad.

Alex 

RE "Atlas Shrugged"  True, aside from the politics, definitely a strong RR plotline.  It also has been recently turned into a 3-part movie.

Google Harry Bedwell. He wrote many of the fiction stories which appeared in the old Railroad magazine. The central character in his stories is a boomer operator named Eddie Sand.

He wrote some GREAT railroad fiction.

Jesse, the author is Dee Brown.

Murnane,  I'm glad you liked the Spearman and Packard books. 

  I guess it is also good to know that someone likes On the Blue Coment - I didn't.  I had two big issues with the book plot and content.  From the plot standpoint, why didn't it ever occur to Oscar to go back and save his mother?  From the fact standpoint - I couldn't stand the factual errors not only with respect to toy trains but also with respect to the timeline of historical events.  On the other hand, if you just treat it as an adventure story to be read to a grandkid as a bedtime story then I guess its ok.

Rich Melvin - Bedwell also wrote the novel The Boomer: A Story of the Rails which, of course, was about Eddie Sand. As a side note, if you can't find any of the Railroad Magazines some of Bedwell's short stories have been collected in other books of railroad fiction - for example his story "Smart Boomer" can be found in Short Lines: A collection of Classic American Railroad Stories by Johnson

That book has several great stories. One of my favorite railroad books (non-fiction) is Southern Railroad Man: Conductor N. J. Bell's Recollections. He was a conductor on several different railroads in the south from the mid to late 1800's. Reading it I learned a lot about how railroads operated "back in the day". ISBN#0-87580-184-6

SouthernMike - If you liked Bell's book I think you would also like Brownie the Boomer by Charles Brown - his book is a recounting the events in his career as a boomer during the period from 1900-1913. It was originally published in 1929.  The book was reprinted in 1991 by Northern Illinois University Press and was annotated and edited by H. Roger Grant- the former editor of Railroad History. 

Rich,

   I recommended the Wrecker & the Thief by Clive Cussler & Scott, do an OGR Search for them. Great Steam era mysteries about the Railroads.   Use Recommended Reading for OGR Members, when doing the search.

Great books, especially the Wrecker!

PCRR/Dave