Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, BaronVerified

Bulwer-Lytton's crime novel follows a gentleman-thief through underworld London and aristocratic circles, pioneering the gentleman criminal archetype while exploring how desperation and privilege can lead even the refined to criminal desperation.

A mid-19th-century novel set in a cottage in Devonshire, home to Lady Vargrave and her daughter Evelyn. It opens with talk of Evelyn's coming marriage to Lord Vargrave and her lack of experience, and takes up themes of love, duty and social pressure.