The novel reminded me of a Mark Twain story, the title of which now eludes me, and John Fowles' The French Lieutenant's Woman. Twain interspersed statistics, the effect not unlike the cinematic effect of a voice over describing a city with the subsequent action reflecting the facts. The French Lieutenant's Woman provided Fowles ample opportunities to discourse on Victorian era sociology. (I'm a sucker for this stuff: I have fond memories of a classic sociology study Family and Kinship in East London")
Part of the enjoyment of The Great Train robbery stemmed from deciphering period criminal slang. In one section, ostensibly quoting from the trial transcript one of the thieves explains, "... he plays like a flimp or a dub buzzer, or a mutcher, no interest or importance, and this because he don' want the skipper to granny that a bone lay is afoot." (p 104) and then the theif is perplexed when the judge asks the thief to explain his explanation. (I thought that a judge who dealt with criminals would have mastered the argot, but then this is a novel and the passage is amusing.)
I was struck by one curious difference between the movie and the book: the novel made repeated reference to the mastermind's red beard, but this was not significant enough to have Sean Connery's beard dyed red for the movie.
