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Bleak House

By Charles Dickens
Series: Oxford World's Classics
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Book Hero Magic crafted this summary to help describe this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Summary
Bleak House is Charles Dickens's ambitious exploration of a complex, interwoven narrative that exposes the contrasts of Victorian society—from its elegant elite to its outcasts. At its core is the mystery surrounding Esther Summerson, who unravels the secret of her birth and her mother's tragic past. The story includes a thrilling murder investigation featuring Inspector Bucket, one of literature's earliest detectives. Beyond its mystery and crime elements, the novel offers a powerful fable of redemption where human love transforms the bleakest of places.
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Format: Paperback / softback
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Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?

Ideal for readers who appreciate classic literature with intricate plots, social critique, and early detective fiction.

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Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Description

Bleak House, Dickens's most daring experiment in the narration of a complex plot, challenges the reader to make connections between the fashionable and the outcast, the beautiful and the ugly, the powerful and the victims. Nowhere in Dickens's later novels is his attack on an uncaring society more imaginatively embodied, but nowhere either is the mixture of comedy and angry satire more deftly managed.

Bleak House defies a single description. It is a mystery story, in which Esther Summerson discovers the truth about her birth and her unknown mother's tragic life. It is a murder story, which comes to a climax in a thrilling chase, led by one of the earliest detectives in English fiction, Inspector Bucket. And it is a fable about redemption, in which a bleak house is transformed by the resilience of human love.

ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years, Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?

Critically recognised as a seminal work in the development of crime fiction, Lucy Worsley of the Huffington Post Books describes Bleak House as an undeniably significant novel in the genre.

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Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9780199536313

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Format: Paperback / softback

Date Published: 08 May 2008

Country: United Kingdom

Imprint: Oxford University Press

Illustration: frontispiece, original illustrations by `Phiz', 2 maps

Contributors:

  • Edited by Stephen Gill

Audience: General / adult

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 43.0mm

Width: 129.0mm

Height: 196.0mm

Weight: 667g

Pages: 992

Collections

Charles Dickens Classic Fiction Classic General Fiction Fiction General Fiction Literary Fiction Series: Oxford World's Classics

About the Author

Stephen Gill is Reader in English Literature at Oxford University and Fellow and Tutor at Lincoln College.

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