Old Curiosity Shop (version 3)
The novel that made Victorian England weep in the streets. When young Nell and her beloved grandfather are driven from their antiquarian shop by the malevolent dwarf Quilp, they embark on a desperate journey through an England being reshaped by industry and commerce. Nell's worthless brother, believing the old man hides a fortune, teams with Quilp to hunt them down, forcing motherless Nell to become her grandfather's protector across a landscape of grueling poverty and moral decay. Dickens poured his own childhood losses into this story, crafting a tale so emotionally devastating that readers in America literally waited on docks for ships bearing the next installment. It remains one of the most poignant explorations of innocence besieged in all of literature: a book that break your heart and then makes you grateful for the breaking.
X-Ray
