Delightful, through and through. Chesterton's writing is sharp and witty and funny; his grasp of humanity profound; his love of life effervescent. The ending to The Man Who Was Thursday was not at all what I expected (despite being almost exactly what I expected); The Napoleon of Notting Hill was perfect; The Club of Queer Trades pure fun; and the only sorrow in The Ball and the Cross was that this was the incomplete version. Very, very good.

Long response available here. ( )

v. 1. Heretics; Orthodoxy; The Blatchford controversies --
v. 2. St. Francis of Assisi; The Everlasting man; St. Thomas Aquinas --
v. 3. Where all roads lead; The Catholic Church and conversion; Why I am a Catholic; The thing: Why I am a Catholic; The well and the shallows; The way of the cross -- v. 4. What’s wrong with the world; The Superstition of divorce; Eugenics and other evils; Divorce versus democracy; Social reform versus birth control --
v. 5. The outline of sanity; The appetite of tyranny; The crimes of England; Lord Kitchener; Utopia of usurers; How to help annexation; The end of the Armistice --
v. 6. The club of queer trades; The Napoleon of Notting Hill; The ball and the cross; The man who was thursday --
v. 7. The Ball and the Cross; Manalive; The Flying Inn --
v. 8. The Return of Don Quixote; Tales of the Long Bow; The Man Who Knew Too Much --
v. 10. Collected poetry, Pt.1-2 (2 v.) --
v. 11. Plays and Chesterton on Shaw --
v. 11-12. The father Brown stories, Pt. 1-2 (2v.) --
v. 14. Short stories, fairy tales, mystery stories-illustrations
v. 15. Chesterton on Dickens --
v. 16. The autobiography of G. K. Chesterton --
v. 18. Thomas Carlyle, Leo Tolstoy, Robert Louis Stevenson, Chaucer --
v. 20. Christendom in Dublin; Irish impressions; The new Jerusalem; A short history of England; The patriotic idea; Explaining the English; London; What are reprisals? --
v. 21. What I saw in America; The resurrection of Rome; Sidelights --
v. 27. The Illustrated London News, 1905-1907 --
v. 28. The Illustrated London News, 1908-1910 --
v. 29. The Illustrated London news, 1911-1913 --
v. 30. The Illustrated London news, 1914-1916 --
v. 31. The Illustrated London news, 1917-1919 --
v. 32. The Illustrated London news, 1920-1922 --
v. 33. The illustrated London news, 1923-1925 --
v. 34. The Illustrated London news, 1926-1928 --
v. 35. The Illustrated London news, 1929-1931