Faint streaks of crimson glimmer here and there amidst the rich darkness of the Kentish woods. Autumn's red finger has been lightly laid upon the foliage—sparingly, as the artist puts the brighter tints into his picture: but the grandeur of an August sunset blazes upon the peaceful landscape, and lights all into glory. The encircling woods and wide lawn-like meadows, the still ponds of limpid water, the trim hedges, and the smooth winding roads; undulating hill-tops, melting into the purpl...

Lady Audley’s Secret has been called "the most sensationally successful of all the sensational novels". The success of the book, along with Mary Elizabeth Braddon's other bestseller, Aurora Floyd, established the author as the main rival of the master of the sensational novel, Wilkie Collins. A protest against the passive, insipid 19th-century heroine, Lady Audley was described by one critic of the time as "high-strung, full of passion, purpose, and movement." Her crime (...

The meet was at the Pig and Whistle, at Melbury, nine miles off. Rather a near meet—compared with the usual appointments of the South Sarum hounds—the ostler remarked, as Allan Carew mounted a hired hunter in the yard of the Duke's Head, chief, and indeed only possible inn for a gentleman to put up at, in the little village of Matcham, a small but prosperous hamlet, lying in a hollow of the hills between Salisbury and Andover. He had only arrived on the previous afternoon, and he was sally...

“I’m afraid she will be a terrible bore,” said the lady, with a slight pettishness in the tone of a voice that was naturally sweet. “How can she bore us, love? She is only a child, and you can do what you like with her,” said the gentleman. “My dear John, you have just admitted that she is between thirteen and fourteen—a great deal more than a child—a great overgrown girl, who will want to be taken about in the carriage, and to come down to the drawing-room, and who will be always in the w...

There are some travellers who think when they cross the Tamar, over that fairy bridge of Brunel's, hung aloft between the blue of the river and the blue of the sky, that they have left England behind them on the eastern shore—that they have entered a new country, almost a new world. This land of quiet woods and lonely valleys, and bold brown hills, barren, solitary—these wild commons and large moorlands of Cornwall seem to stand apart, as they did in the days gone by, when this province wa...

Five fantastic mystery stories from prolific Victorian author Mary Elizabeth Braddon: The Cold Embrace The Shadow in the Corner Good Lady Ducayne At Chrighton Abbey Eveline’s Visitant

I dont’t suppose it rained harder in the good town of Slopperton-on-the-Sloshy than it rained anywhere else. But it did rain. There was scarcely an umbrella in Slopperton that could hold its own against the rain that came pouring down that November afternoon, between the hours of four and five. Every gutter in High Street, Slopperton; every gutter in Broad Street (which was of course the narrowest street); in New Street (which by the same rule was the oldest street); in East Street, West S...

The story revolves around the beautiful and enigmatic Lady Audley, who has married Sir Michael Audley, a wealthy landowner. However, it soon becomes apparent that Lady Audley is harboring a dark secret from her past. As the plot unfolds, the protagonist, Robert Audley, Sir Michael's nephew, becomes suspicious of Lady Audley's behavior and sets out to uncover the truth behind her mysterious actions.Braddon skillfully weaves a narrative filled with intrigue, suspense, and psychological tensi...

The Cloven Foot is a Victorian sensation novel of deceit, inheritance, and scandal. John Treverton must marry his cousin Laura to claim his uncle’s estate, yet harbors a secret past as Jack Chicot, married to a French dancer. When she is murdered, suspicion falls on him, threatening his freedom and future. Braddon explores hidden identities, moral conflict, and the perilous consequences of ambition and duplicity.

16 Complete Works of Mary Elizabeth BraddonBirds of PreyCharlotte's InheritanceFenton's QuestHenry DunbarJohn Marchmont's Legacy, Volumes I-IIILady Audley's SecretLondon PrideMilly Darrell and Other TalesPhantom FortuneRun to EarthThe Doctor's WifeThe Golden CalfThe Lovels of ArdenVixen, Volume IVixen, Volume IIVixen, Volume III

It lay down in a hollow, rich with fine old timber and luxuriant pastures; and you came upon it through an avenue of limes, bordered on either side by meadows, over the high hedges of which the cattle looked inquisitively at you as you passed, wondering, perhaps, what you wanted; for there was no thorough-fare, and unless you were going to the Court you had no business there at all. At the end of this avenue there was an old arch and a clock tower, with a stupid, bewildering clock, which h...

There were two surgeons in the little town of Graybridge-on-the-Wayverne, in pretty pastoral Midlandshire,—Mr. Pawlkatt, who lived in a big, new, brazen-faced house in the middle of the queer old High Street; and John Gilbert, the parish doctor, who lived in his own house on the outskirts of Graybridge, and worked very hard for a smaller income than that which the stylish Mr. Pawlkatt derived from his aristocratic patients. John Gilbert was an elderly man, with a young son. He had married ...