Our Mutual Friend: Library Edition

This sinister masterpiece was Dickenss last completed novel and perhaps his ultimate vision of a dark, macabre London and the corrupting power of money. Opening with a father and daughter scavenging for corpses on the Thames, this chilling tale unfolds around drownings, disguises and doubles, violence, murder, and triumphant love. Young John Harmon, presumed killed on his return home to England, is very much alive. The heir to a dust merchants fortune, he goes to work under an assumed name for his fathers current heirs, the amicable, elderly Boffinswho are about to be blackmailed by the unscrupulous one-legged Wegg. So begins the intrigue in a novel that is quintessentially Dickensian in flavorin its grotesque caricatures, its rich symbolism, and in the astonishing realism of its heroine, Bella Wilfer, one of Dickenss most splendid female characters. One of Dickenss most satisfying novels, and a fitting denouement to his prolific career. Amazon.com The fact that Dickens is always thought of as a caricaturist, although he was constantly trying to be something else, is perhaps the surest mark of his genius. George Orwell