Charles Felix

Charles Felix is the pseudonym attached to The Notting Hill Mystery, a novel first serialized in 1862–1863 and often described as one of the earliest full-length detective novels in English. Modern reference sources identify the author behind that name as Charles Warren Adams (1833–1903), an English lawyer, publisher, and campaigner against vivisection.

Because he published fiction under a pen name and left a light public trail as a novelist, biographical details about "Charles Felix" are relatively sparse. What stands out is the lasting reputation of The Notting Hill Mystery, whose case-file structure and investigative focus helped it feel strikingly modern to later crime-fiction readers.

For listeners interested in the roots of detective fiction, Charles Felix offers a glimpse of the genre before Sherlock Holmes became its defining figure: experimental, atmospheric, and surprisingly ahead of its time.