Ellery Queen reportedly called him “The first important Teutonic sleuth.” In the early years of the 20th Century, he was known in German-speaking countries as "The Viennese Sherlock Holmes." His name is Dagobert Trostler, the creation of an Austrian writer and journalist named Adalbert Goldscheider, who wrote under the name of Balduin Groller. Those stories in their original language were collected into half a dozen small volumes between 1910 and 1912, but – for whatever reason – they were never translated for the English language market.
A couple of years ago, a small publishing house, Kazabo Books, brought out a short volume containing English language translations of six of the original stories about Dagobert Trostler. The book is called The Adventures of Dagobert Trostler, Vienna’s Sherlock Holmes. The book also contains an excellent (and uncredited) foreword with information about Dagobert Trostler and his creator, Balduin Groller. It's the subject of today's audio review on the Classic Mysteries podcast, and the publisher has sent me an e-book copy for this review. You can listen to the review by clicking here. [LINK FIXED - was broken before. Sorry!] The review will provide you with a rundown on the individual stories to be found in the book.
The short stories in this collection of The Adventures of Dagobert Trostler are not about murders; rather, they are about non-violent but serious crimes, such as blackmail and theft. The stories are quite entertaining, and I do hope that the publisher might be able to find more of the Dagobert stories available for translation. The book provides a good taste of the mysteries involved and more than a hint of the way life was lived by the Viennese upper classes at the turn of the 20th century in the waning years of the Austro-Hungarian empire leading up to the First World War. The book is The Adventures of Dagobert Trostler, by Balduin Groller, and I think you’d enjoy it. It's currently available both as a paperback and in e-book editions.
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