The Trail of the Serpent (Modern Library Classics) @ richardeward.com

The Trail of the Serpent (Modern Library Classics)
by Mary Braddon
from Modern Library

Customer Reviews:

• Avg. Customer Rating: 4.0 / 5.0

• Mary Braddon's First Novel Is a Lurid Melodrama
  Mary Elizabeth Braddon's first novel is a lurid melodrama in which you see plenty of crimes -- murder, blackmail, revenge, etc. Every element found in melodramaric story is thrown into the book, and not surprisingly, it even has some rudimentary detective novel quality.

  The story is rather simple; it is about a man called "Daredevil Dick" who is wrongly arrested for killing his rich uncle. Despite the strong belief of Mr. Peters (who is to play the detective role) that Richard is innocent, his plea is... more info

• panache, dash, and brio
  Pure pleasure, or nearly so, from beginning to end. Written in surprisingly accessible prose (for a nineteenth-century novel, that is), Trail of the Serpent zips from reversal to counter-reversal, including one that knocked me completely for a loop, and I pride myself on figuring these sorts of things out. There are the odd longueurs, particularly in the last third, but this is a great rediscovery, and if you're at all fond of Woman in White, Moonstone, Drood, etc., you'll have a blast.

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