Barchester Towers, the sequel to The Warden, is the second novel in Trollope’s major series, the Chronicles of Barsetshire. It focuses on the power struggle between Archdeacon Grantly, Mr Slope and the Proudies as they fight for control of the diocese of Barchester. Meanwhile, another struggle is taking place for the heart of Eleanor Bold. Who will win her? The vile Mr Slope, the idling Bertie Stanhope or someone else entirely? This is a witty and sparkling novel about greed, hate and love...

Dr Thorne, the third novel in Anthony Trollope’s Chronicles of Barsetshire, sees the author steer away from the church politics of the first two novels and move towards the scandals and prejudice of the upper tiers of Victorian era aristocracies. It tells the tale of Frank Gresham and Mary Thorne, a couple intent on marriage despite their conflicting social backgrounds. Frank is engaged in a fierce battle with his family as his mother vehemently opposes the marriage and pushes him to marry...

Before Sir Florian Eustace dies, he gives his beloved wife Lizzie a beautiful and expensive diamond necklace valued over £10,000. Dispute soon rages between the Eustace family and the manipulative and conniving Lizzie: it’s claimed that the diamonds are a precious family heirloom, but Lizzie argues they were a gift. Is she lying? As the family’s lawyer determines to reunite them with the jewels, Lizzie resorts to increasingly desperate measures, until one day the jewels are stolen. Who is ...

The Way We Live Now is a complex and compulsive tale that traces the career of Augustus Melmotte, a strange and mysterious financier who bursts into London society like a guided missile. In setting up a dubious scheme based on speculative money and stock market gambles, Melmotte manages to lure in several members of the English aristocracy, for whom money is the summum bonum. The world is at his feet, until the corruption catches up with him. Considered one of Trollope’s greatest works, Th...

Young, attractive and wealthy, Alice Vavasor is a woman in the prime of her life. And yet one question torments her: ‘What should a woman do with her life?’ Torn between the kind but dull Mr Grey and her dangerous and exciting cousin George, she is prone to constant indecision and uncertainty, much to the detriment of Mr Grey. Can you Forgive Her? is a crisp and engaging novel, brimming with romance, humour and pathos. It is the first of six in Trollope’s celebrated Palliser series.

Bereft of his beloved wife Glencora and his role as Prime Minister, Plantagenet Palliser enters the realm of family politics as he struggles to guide and connect with his three wayward children. Lord Silverbridge, the Duke’s first born and natural inheritor, expelled from Oxford, a gambler at the racetrack and an elected Conservative, further troubles his father when he becomes engaged to Isabel Boncassen, a vibrant and witty American heiress of low social status. Lady Mary, his daughter, ...

In Framley Parsonage, the fourth novel of Trollope’s Chronicles of Barsetshire, the author leaves the confines of Barchester and looks to the countryside, where he relates the moral difficulties of Mark Robarts, the young clergyman who has recently been appointed Vicar of Framley Parsonage. Desperate to keep up with the local aristocracy, the country parson is persuaded to underwrite the debts of Sowerby, a well-respected peer. However, when the debts are called in, Robarts finds himself i...

Phineas Finn, a handsome young man of 23, comes to England to make his fortune in parliamentary politics. But despite all his aspirations, Finn is haunted by ethical questions as his personal convictions conflict with his duty towards his party. Loyalty versus honour, love versus money, and privacy versus prominence: our eponymous hero faces a variety of dilemmas as he navigates his way through the House of Commons. The second installment of Trollope’s celebrated Palliser series, Phineas F...

For three hundred years The Pilgrim’s Progress has remained perhaps the best loved and most read of devotional fictions. In plain yet powerful and moving language, Bunyan tells the story of Christian’s struggle to attain salvation and the Gates of Heaven. He must pass through the Slough of Despond, ward off the temptations of Vanity Fair and fight the monstrous Apollyon… In Part Two, his wife and children follow the same path, helped and protected by Great-Heart, until for them too ‘the tr...

The fifth novel in the Chronicles of Barsetshire, The Small House at Allington, concerns the lives of the two Dale girls, Lily and Bell, who live at the Small House. While Bell is in love with the local doctor, James Crofts, Lily is pursued by two men: the worldly, rich and handsome Adolphus Crosbie and the poor but honest Johnny Eames. With each determined to gain her hand in marriage, who will she choose? Enshrined as a literary classic, The Small House takes the reader on a delightful v...

When the liberal government falls and neither party is able to form a cabinet, Plantagenet Palliser is called upon to lead a coalition government. He is reluctant at first, and displays none of the charisma of his predecessors, but eventually he grows into the role. However, his confidence is short-lived as he becomes embroiled in a scandal involving the villainous Ferdinand Lopez unintentionally brought about by Lady Glencora Palliser. Pronounced ‘a beautiful book’ by Leo Tolstoy, The Pri...

In The Last Chronicle of Barset, Trollope concludes his saga of ecclesiastical life. At the heart of the novel is the plight of Josiah Crawley, a proud, impoverished clergyman who faces difficult legal circumstances. Caught amidst poverty, Josiah appears to have stolen a cheque and is forced to stand trial despite the fact that he cannot remember the cheque’s origins. To make matters worse, his daughter Grace desperately seeks the approval of Archdeacon Grantly, whose son she intends to ma...