Faulks on Fiction (Includes 2 Vintage Classics): Great British Villains and the Secret Life of the Novel
  • Published: 27 January 2011
  • ISBN: 9781446416297
  • Imprint: BBC Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 400

Faulks on Fiction (Includes 2 Vintage Classics): Great British Villains and the Secret Life of the Novel

Buy from…
Amazon Apple Books Google Play Kobo Booktopia eBooks.com

A compelling and personal look at the British novel through its greatest fictional villains by bestselling novelist Sebastian Faulks. This special edition also includes two classic novels.

The publication of Robinson Crusoe in London in 1719 marked the arrival of a revolutionary art form: the novel. British writers were prominent in shaping the new type of storytelling - one which reflected the experiences of ordinary people, with characters in whom readers could find not only an escape, but a deeper understanding of their own lives.

But the novel was more than just a reflection of British life. As Sebastian Faulks explains in this engaging literary and social history, it also helped invent the British. By focusing not on writers but on the people they gave us, Faulks not only celebrates the recently neglected act of novelistic creation but shows how the most enduring fictional characters over the centuries have helped map the British psyche. In this ebook, Sebastian celebrates the greatest villains in fiction - from Fagin to Barbara Covett.

Also included are two classic novels:
Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens: Oliver Twist, born into tragedy, runs away to London with the naive hope for a brighter future. In this classic, Dickens graphically conjures up the capital's underworld, full of prostitutes, thieves and lost and homeless children.
The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins: Marian and her sister Laura live a quiet life under their uncle's guardianship until Laura's marriage to Sir Percival Glyde, a man of many secrets. Can she be protected from a mysterious and potentially fatal plot?
  • Published: 27 January 2011
  • ISBN: 9781446416297
  • Imprint: BBC Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 400
Categories:
Share…

About the author

Sebastian Faulks

Sebastian Faulks was born in April 1953. Before becoming a full-time writer in 1991, he worked as a journalist. Sebastian Faulks’s books include A Possible Life, Human Traces, On Green Dolphin Street, Engleby, Birdsong, A Week in December and Where My Heart Used to Beat.

portrait photo of Sebastian Faulks

Also by Sebastian Faulks

The Seventh Son
Snow Country
Paris Echo
War
Pistache Returns
Where My Heart Used to Beat
Jeeves and the Wedding Bells
See all

Praise for Faulks on Fiction (Includes 2 Vintage Classics): Great British Villains and the Secret Life of the Novel

It's no mystery why James Patterson is the world's most popular thriller writer: his uncanny skill in creating living, breathing characters we truly feel for and seamless, lightning-fast plots. I do this for a living, and he still manages to keep me guessing from the first to last page ... Simply put: Nobody does it better.

JEFFREY DEAVER

Behind all the noise and the numbers, we shouldn't forget that no one gets this big without amazing natural storytelling talent - which is what Jim has, in spades. The Alex Cross series proves it.

LEE CHILD, bestselling author of the Jack Reacher series

James Patterson is The Boss. End of.

IAN RANKIN, bestselling author of the Inspector Rebus series

wrote, "Along Came a Spider is the best thriller I've come across in many a year. It deserves to be this season's no. 1 bestseller and should instantly make James Patterson a household name." A household name, indeed.

NELSON DEMILLE

Every once in a while a writer comes along and fundamentally changes the way people read. He or she is so bright, so innovative, so industrious that what they envision and create becomes the measure by which all others are judged. In 1993 one such writer - James Patterson - began to do just that ... James Patterson is the gold standard by which all others are judged.

STEVE BERRY, bestselling author of the Colton Malone series

[Alex Cross] has become one of the greatest fictional detectives of all time, a character for the ages.

DOUGLAS PRESTON and LINCOLN CHILD

Patterson boils a scene down to the single, telling detail, the element that defines a character or moves a plot along. It's what fires off the movie projector in the reader's mind.

MICHAEL CONNELLY

Patterson knows where our deepest fears are buried... there's no stopping his imagination.

NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW

Patterson is in a class by himself.

VANITY FAIR