' The year is 1837 and a stranger is prowling London.

Not since Caleb Carr's The Alienist have the shadowy city streets of the nineteenth century lit up with such mystery and romance.From the Trade Paperback edition. And as all the various schemes converge, Maggs rises into the center, a dark looming figure, at once frightening, mysterious, and compelling. But Maggs is obsessed with a plan of his own. The writer Tobias Oates wants to possess his soul through hypnosis. He has the demeanor of a savage and the skills of a hardened criminal, and he is risking his life on seeking vengeance and reconciliation.? Installing himself within the household of the genteel grocer Percy Buckle, Maggs soon attracts the attention of a cross section of London society. He is Jack Maggs, an illegal returnee from the prison island of Australia. The year is 1837 and a stranger is prowling London. He can be angry and deluded, but he's ultimately still a likable character.Turtle N-Triple JSON-LD RDF/XML HTML Contact Us Home Jack Maggs : a novel The Booker Prize-winning author of Oscar and Lucinda returns to the nineteenth century in an utterly captivating mystery. However, his love for Phipps and his original country of England makes him likable. It's sometimes hard to understand why he has to put himself through so much before he can come to the point where he goes back home. Throughout the novel you're itching for Jack Maggs to drop his illusions and return back to Australia. The reader, as yet, doesn't even know his name. One thinks he's a farmer, and another a servant wearing his master's old clothes. All the passengers speculate on the purpose of his trip to London, examining his enormous shoulders, rough face and fine clothes. He's a mystery both to the other passengers in the carriage and to the reader. The scene at the beginning of the book where Jack arrives in London.

So it's not necessarily pleasant, but it is definitely more realistic.

However, it radically updates the sensibilities of the Victorian novel, dealing with abortion, homosexuality and rape. I really enjoyed “Great Expectations,” and though this book is nothing like it, it has some of the same kind of extreme characters and extremely enjoyable writing as Dickens' novel.

Jack maggs