{"title":"Books by Mary Elizabeth Braddon","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9780141198842","title":"Penguin English Library Lady Audley's Secret","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe Penguin English Library Edition of \u003ci\u003eLady Audley's Secret \u003c\/i\u003eby Mary Elizabeth Braddon\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e'Lady Audley uttered a long, low, wailing cry, and threw up her arms above her head with a wild gesture of despair'\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn this outlandish, outrageous triumph of scandal fiction, a new Lady Audley arrives at the manor: young, beautiful - and very mysterious. Why does she behave so strangely? What, exactly, is the dark secret this seductive outsider carries with her? A huge success in the nineteenth century, the book's anti-heroine - with her good looks and hidden past - embodied perfectly the concerns of the Victorian age with morality and madness.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe Penguin English Library - 100 editions of the best fiction in English, from the eighteenth century and the very first novels to the beginning of the First World War.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43201452114098,"sku":"9780141198842","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780141198842_95619541-2ba8-4290-ac62-c42218344736.jpg?v=1786011023"},{"product_id":"9780199577033","title":"Lady Audley's Secret","description":"'it only rests with yourself to become Lady Audley, and the mistress of Audley Court'When beautiful young Lucy Graham accepts the hand of Sir Michael Audley, her fortune and her future look secure. But Lady Audley's past is shrouded in mystery, and to Sir Michael's nephew Robert, she is not all that she seems. When his good friend George Talboys suddenly disappears, Robert is determined to find him, and to unearth the truth. His quest reveals a tangled story of lies and deception, crime and intrigue, whose sensational twists turn the conventional picture of Victorian womanhood on its head. Can Robert's darkest suspicions really be true?Lady Audley's Secret was an immediate bestseller, and readers have enjoyed its thrilling plot ever since its first publication in 1862. This new edition explores Braddon's portrait of her scheming heroine in the context of the nineteenth-century sensation novel and the lively, often hostile debates it provoked. 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.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43201531904178,"sku":"9780199577033","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780199577033_8b0dfe7c-6b4e-4fca-af7d-8186beba9384.jpg?v=1786012332"},{"product_id":"9780199555161","title":"Aurora Floyd","description":"With Lady Audley's Secret, Mary Elizabeth Braddon had established herself, alongside Wilkie Collins and Mrs Henry Wood, as one of the ruling triumvirate of `sensation novelists'. Aurora Floyd (1862-3), following hot on its heels, achieved almost equal popularity and notoriety. Like Lady Audley, Aurora is a beautiful young woman bigamously married and threatened with exposure by a blackmailer. But in Aurora Floyd, and in many of the novels written in imitation of it, bigamy is little more than a euphemism, a device to enable the heroine, and vicariously the reader, to enjoy the forbidden sweets of adultery without adulterous intentions. Passionate, sometimes violent, Aurora does succeed in enjoying them, her desires scarcely chastened by her disastrous first marriage. She represents a challenge to the mid-Victorian sexual code, and particularly to the feminine ideal of simpering, angelic young ladyhood.  P. D. Edward's introduction evaluates the novel's leading place among `bigamy-novels' and Braddon's treatment of the power struggle between the sexes, as well as considering the similarities between the author and her heroine. 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.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56227727114613,"sku":"9780199555161","price":11.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780199555161_6760b5cc-f52a-46bb-803e-7306ba572ceb.jpg?v=1786012142"},{"product_id":"9781420967319","title":"Lady Audley's Secret","description":"\u003cp\u003eFirst published serially in 1861, Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s “Lady Audley's Secret” is the wildly successful Victorian-era sensation novel. Sensation novels were very popular in English literature in the 1860s and 1870s. The novels were a combination of realism and romance and were usually tales of terrible crimes, such as murder, kidnapping, bigamy, adultery, and theft, occurring in otherwise normal, tranquil domestic settings. “Lady Audley’s Secret” was one of the most popular novels of the genre and revolves around Robert Audley, a man determined to find out the cause of his friend’s, George Talboys, disappearance. At the center of the mystery is Robert’s uncle’s wife, Lucy Audley, the Lady Audley of the novel’s title and who Robert suspects of keeping secrets. With George’s young son in questionable safety and lies, deception, and treachery surrounding him, Robert must uncover all that Lady Audley has hidden about her past while finding himself in increasing danger. A bestseller in Victorian England despite its scandalously immoral content, “Lady Audley’s Secret” addresses the domestic anxieties and gender and class conflicts of the era while at the same time featuring a remarkable and complex female character. This edition is printed on premium acid-free paper.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56299467047285,"sku":"9781420967319","price":7.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781420967319_5eb80249-4842-4d89-b389-0ea06e776a7e.jpg?v=1786019160"},{"product_id":"9781551111230","title":"Aurora Floyd","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eAurora Floyd\u003c\/em\u003e is one of the leading novels in the genre known as ‘sensation fiction’—a tradition in which the key texts include Wilkie Collins’s \u003cem\u003eThe Woman in White\u003c\/em\u003e, Ellen Wood’s \u003cem\u003eEast Lynne\u003c\/em\u003e, and Dickens’s \u003cem\u003eGreat Expectations\u003c\/em\u003e. When \u003cem\u003eAurora Floyd\u003c\/em\u003e was first published in serial form in 1862-63, Fraser’s magazine asserted that “a book without a murder, a divorce, a seduction, or a bigamy, is not apparently considered either worth writing or reading; and a mystery and a secret are the chief qualifications of the modern novel.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe novel depicts a heroine trapped in an abusive and adulterous marriage, and effectively dramatizes the extra-legal pressures which kept many such unhappy marriages out of the courts: fear of personal scandal, and of betraying one’s family through the publicity and expense of the process. Aurora’s bigamous marriage dramatizes the need for expeditious divorce without the enormous social cost, but the overt sexuality of the heroine shocked contemporary critics. “What is held up to us as the story of the feminine soul as it really exists underneath its conventional coverings, is a very fleshy and unlovely record,” wrote Margaret Oliphant.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBraddon’s text is studded with references to contemporary events (the Crimean War, the Divorce Act of 1857) and the text has been carefully annotated for modern readers in this edition, which also includes a range of documents designed to help set the text in context.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56303970419061,"sku":"9781551111230","price":31.75,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781551111230_7d234acd-8c2a-4b5f-868c-ee837889b1e6.jpg?v=1786023239"},{"product_id":"9781961884380","title":"Lady Audley's Secret","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eLucy Graham, radiantly beautiful, born to poverty, and Sir Michael Audley, aging aristocratic widower and fabulously wealthy, are married soon after first glance. \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLife is peaceful at old Audley Court until the arrival of Robert Audley– Sir Michael’s nephew– and his friend George Talboys, who is home again after making his fortune in Australia.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhen George mysteriously disappears, Robert takes it upon himself to find him again. Developing a detective’s eye, following disturbing clue after clue, Robert becomes convinced his alluring Aunt Lucy isn’t as innocent, or possibly as sane, as she seems.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eLady Audley’s Secret\u003c\/i\u003e first appeared in\u003ci\u003e Robin Goodfellow \u003c\/i\u003emagazine in 1861, establishing it as a “sensational” novel to rival Wilkie Collins’ \u003ci\u003eThe Woman in White\u003c\/i\u003e (1860). A cunningly plotted mystery novel as sensual as a Pre-Raphaelite portrait, \u003ci\u003eLady Audley’s Secret \u003c\/i\u003eprobes mid-Victorian anxieties about the rapid rise of consumerism with the invention of one of literature’s great villainesses who goes to great lengths to secure her greatest desires.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56309285880181,"sku":"9781961884380","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781961884380_6d39ccb6-c382-4e85-976d-63afd1253425.jpg?v=1786030459"},{"product_id":"9783842434325","title":"Birds of Prey","description":"This book is part of the TREDITION CLASSICS series. The creators of this series are united by passion for literature and driven by the intention of making all public domain books available in printed format again - worldwide. At tredition we believe that a great book never goes out of style. Several mostly non-profit literature projects provide content to tredition. To support their good work, tredition donates a portion of the proceeds from each sold copy. As a reader of a TREDITION CLASSICS book, you support our mission to save many of the amazing works of world literature from oblivion.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56311142809973,"sku":"9783842434325","price":22.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9783842434325_73220dbc-a6c1-4c3a-9626-9764315c2718.jpg?v=1786031821"},{"product_id":"9780199549801","title":"The Doctor's Wife","description":"`Isabel Gilbert was not a woman of the world. She had read novels while other people perused the Sunday papers...she believed in a phantasmal world created out of the pages of poets and romancers.'  The Doctor's Wife is Mary Elizabeth Braddon's rewriting of Flaubert's Madame Bovary in which she explores her heroine's sense of entrapment and alienation in middle-class provincial life married to a good natured but bovine husband who seems incapable of understanding his wife's imaginative life and feelings. A woman with a secret, adultery, death and the spectacle of female recrimination and suffering are the elements which combine to make The Doctor's Wife a classic women's sensation novel. Yet, The Doctor's Wife is also a self-consciously literary novel, in which Braddon attempts to transcend the sensation genre. This is the only edition of a fascinating and engrossing work, and reproduces uncut the first three-volume edition of 1864. 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.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56311620108661,"sku":"9780199549801","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780199549801_36fe3e2c-41f6-4e4e-8310-bacd210820f3.jpg?v=1786012997"},{"product_id":"lady-audleys-secret","title":"Lady Audley's Secret","description":"Weathering critical scorn, Lady Audley's Secret quickly established Mary Elizabeth Braddon as the leading light of Victorian 'sensation' fiction, sharing the honour only with Wilkie Collins. Addictive, cunningly plotted and certainly sensational, Lady Audley's Secret draws on contemporary theories of insanity to probe mid-Victorian anxieties about the rapid rise of consumer culture. What is the mystery surrounding the charming heroine? Lady Audley's secret is investigated by Robert Audley, aristocrat turned detective, in a novel that has lost none of its power to disturb and entertain.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57481507602805,"sku":"9780140435849","price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780140435849.jpg?v=1786089773"},{"product_id":"lady-audley-s-secret","title":"Lady Audley’s Secret","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eWith an Introduction and Notes by Esther Saxey\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe flaxen-haired beauty of the childlike Lady Audley would suggest that she has no secrets. But M.E. Braddon’s classic novel of sensation uncovers the truth about its heroine in a plot involving bigamy, arson and murder. It challenges assumptions about the nature of femininity and investigates the narrow divide between sanity and insanity, using as its focus one of the most fascinating of all Victorian heroines.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eCombining elements of the detective novel, the psychological thriller and the romance of upper class life, \u003cem\u003eLady Audley’s Secret\u003c\/em\u003e was one of the most popular and successful novels of the nineteenth century and still exerts a powerful hold on readers.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57490215698805,"sku":"9781853267260","price":4.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781853267260.jpg?v=1786442100"},{"product_id":"lady-audleys-secret-1","title":"Lady Audley's Secret","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eLady Audley’s Secret \u003c\/i\u003eis a thrilling page-turner portraying evil intentions and murderous schemes amidst Victorian gender conventions and class structure. It was an instant bestseller upon first publication in 1862.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhen newcomer Lucy Graham, a young and beautiful governess, meets the village’s wealthy widower, Sir Michael Audley, he is immediately smitten. The couple marry, and Lucy’s fortune and position are completely changed. Nobody really knows where she came from or where she grew up, but Lucy is now universally loved.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSir Michael’s nephew Robert is the only one who harbours a few suspicions and wants to find out more. What shadows might lurk in Lucy’s past? 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