Published in 1886, The Bostonians begins with the arrival in Boston of Basil Ransom, a young Mississippi lawyer in search of a...

In the fourth of the 'Palliser' stories, Trollope follows Phineas Finn's return to the dangerous world of Westminster politics....

With its insightful portrayals of her protagonist's inner life, Ann Radcliffe's The Mysteries of Udolpho was a hugely influential...

When Reverend Josiah Crawley, the impoverished curate of Hogglestock, is accused of theft it causes a public scandal, sending...

One of the most significant and intriguing Gothic novels of the Victorian period and is enjoyed today as a modern psychological...

Elizabeth Gaskell's chilling Gothic tales blend the real and the supernatural to eerie, compelling effect. 'Disappearances',...

Channelling a razor-sharp satire through the everyday mishaps of the immortal comic character Mr Pooter, George and Weedon...

'One of Dickens's most neglected, but most rewarding, novels' Peter Ackroyd

Set against the backdrop of the Gordon Riots of...

Carpenter Adam Bede is in love with the beautiful Hetty Sorrel, but unknown to him, he has a rival, in the local squire’s son...

The first romantic historical novel and international bestseller, Waverley (1814) tells the story of Edward Waverley, a naive,...

Guy Mannering is an astrologer who only half-believes in his art. Instead he places his faith in patriarchal power, wealth and...

In the court of Elizabeth I, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, is favoured above all the noblemen of England. It is rumoured that...

The Penguin Classics edition of Jonathan Swift's savagely satirical A Modest Proposal and Other Writings is edited with an...

Applying his controversial theory of evolution to the origins of the human species, Charles Darwin's The Descent of Man was the...

Returning home to tend her widowed father Dr Marjoribanks, Lucilla soon launches herself into Carlingford society, aiming to...

'Among the most powerful things Dickens ever did in fiction' Guardian

Greed has led wealthy old Martin Chuzzlewit to become...

'One of my life's greatest tragedies is to have already read Pickwick Papers - I can't go back and read it for the first time'...

Matthew Lewis's Gothic masterpiece, depicting a holy man slowly becoming entangled in a web of sin, The Monk is edited with an...

Composed in medieval Iceland, Hrolf's Saga is one of the greatest of all mythic-legendary sagas, relating half-fantastical events...

'The noblest and most lovable of the great philosophers ... ethically he is supreme' Bertrand Russell

Published shortly after...

Barely acknowledged in his lifetime, the New Science of Giambattista Vico (1668-1744) is an astonishingly perceptive and...

When young Francis Osbaldistone discovers that his vicious and scheming cousin Rashleigh has designs both on his father's...

The arrival of two newcomers in the quiet village of Mellstock arouses a bitter feud and leaves a convoluted love affair in its...

'There's no writing against such power as this - one has no chance' William Makepeace Thackeray

A compelling depiction of a...

When Elfrise Swanston meets Stephen Smith she is attracted to his handsome face, gentle bearing and the sense of mystery which...

One of the key works in the nineteenth-century battle between science and Scripture, Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology...

Hardy described Desperate Remedies as a tale of 'mystery, entanglement, surprise and moral obliquity'.

Cytherea has taken a...

'A revelation ... as well as being sympathetic to the plight of children, it is hilarious' A. N. Wilson

The hero of Dickens's...

The daughter of a wealthy railway magnate, Paula Power inherits De Stancy Castle, an ancient castle in need of modernization. She...

'Ambiguities indeed! One long brain-muddling, soul-bewildering ambiguity (to borrow Mr. Melville's style), like Melchisedeck,...