It is superbly researched, vividly written, and captivating from first to last. Murder By the Book combines this thrilling true-crime story with an illuminating account of the rise of the novel form and the battle for its early soul among the most famous writers of the time. Claire Harman Community Reviews Summary of 190 reviews Content Warnings Murder by the Book: A. When Lord William's murderer finally confessed his guilt, he would cite this novel in his defense. Murder by the Book: A Sensational Chapter in Victorian Crime. One such phenomenon was William Harrison Ainsworth's Jack Sheppard, the story of an unrepentant criminal who escaped the gallows time and again. Even Dickens and Thackeray, both at the beginning of their careers, fell under the spell of these tales-Dickens publicly admiring them, Thackeray rejecting them. The best-selling titles were the most sensational true-crime stories. In the years just before the murder, new printing methods had made books cheap and abundant, the novel form was on the rise, and suddenly everyone was reading. The missing clue, it turned out, lay in the unlikeliest place: what Courvoisier had been reading.
The police suspected Russell's valet, Courvoisier, but the evidence was weak. The brutal murder had the whole city talking. In May 1840, Lord William Russell, well known in London's highest social circles, was found with his throat cut.
A page-turner that can hold its own with any one of the many murder-minded podcasts out there."įrom the acclaimed biographer-the fascinating, little-known story of a Victorian-era murder that rocked literary London, leading Charles Dickens, William Thackeray, and Queen Victoria herself to wonder: Can a novel kill?
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