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Masterpieces of the English Short Novel: Nine Complete Short Novels
These nine novels are "the best of the best"—great writing by some of the most brilliant literary minds of the 18th and 19th centuries.
Samuel Johnson's biography of Richard Savage raises the life of a scoundrel to the level of great art; George Eliot profoundly influenced Henry James with her horror story, The Lifted Veil ; Le Fanu writes a "sinister but gracious" supernatural Gothic; Nightmare Abbey is Thomas Love Peacock's satire on his friends, the Romantic poets Shelley, Coleridge, and Byron.
These, with other short novels in this collection, represent the pinnacle of achievement in their genre.
Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade, Yucca, and Good Books imprints, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in fiction—novels, novellas, political and medical thrillers, comedy, satire, historical fiction, romance, erotic and love stories, mystery, classic literature, folklore and mythology, literary classics including Shakespeare, Dumas, Wilde, Cather, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.
Samuel Johnson's biography of Richard Savage raises the life of a scoundrel to the level of great art; George Eliot profoundly influenced Henry James with her horror story, The Lifted Veil ; Le Fanu writes a "sinister but gracious" supernatural Gothic; Nightmare Abbey is Thomas Love Peacock's satire on his friends, the Romantic poets Shelley, Coleridge, and Byron.
These, with other short novels in this collection, represent the pinnacle of achievement in their genre.
Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade, Yucca, and Good Books imprints, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in fiction—novels, novellas, political and medical thrillers, comedy, satire, historical fiction, romance, erotic and love stories, mystery, classic literature, folklore and mythology, literary classics including Shakespeare, Dumas, Wilde, Cather, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.
672 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 1992
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 19, 2025
Overall, good writing but I was bored throughout most of the stories. The first story was a depressing trainwreck for the main character and the rest weren't that much better. As such this book was filled with run-on sentences, which is not my cup of tea. It was certainly very dated but as that's the time period, such can't be helped. 3.5 ⭐ rounded up generously.
March 2, 2021
Nine short novels. Novellas. My sentiments:
1. Life of Richard Savage by Samuel Johnson - The story about a born loser, and the most boring, depressing read in this collection. No stars.
2. Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth - Another story about an ineffectual man, actually generations of them. Two stars.
3. The Room in the Dragon Volant by Sheridan Joseph Le Fanu - Count on Le Fanu to give us his usual, predictable gothic yarn, engaging only because of his precise gift for atmosphere and setting--I'm bound to confuse this as a movie someday, with a strapping Stewart Granger in the lead role of yet another ineffectual man (surely I can't be the only reader who saw what was coming, early on!). Three stars.
4. Cousin Phillis by Mrs. Gaskell - A story that narrowly escaped being a tragedy. Reading it reminded me of Thomas Hardy's Far from the Madding Crowd. All decent, sincere characters here, the only antagonist being great expectations (and I don't mean mine). Two and half stars.
5. The Lifted Veil by George Eliot - I detect none of the magic that endeared Middlemarch to me here. Depressing, certainly. Dispirited bildungsroman of a weakling. Two stars.
6. The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad - This started out slow, as benign as the windless bay where the narrative takes place. But what an exhilarating finish! I haven’t read much of Conrad's work, but the few I've read* I hold dear: Lord Jim, Typhoon, and now this. Onboard are the Joseph Conrad refrains I’ve come to recognize: second chances and ambiguous heroes. Anti-heroes. But—was this a ghost story? Of doppelgangers? And was there a tinge of what once was the love that dare not speak its name? Five stars.
7. The Case of General Ople and Lady Camper by George Meredith - Much ado over not much. And behold, surely, the most ineffectual general ever to grace the fiction section. One star.
8. Nightmare Abbey by Thomas Love Peacock - A very toned-down As You Like It, it might as well be sepia. I think my brain processed it as a comic book while I was reading this. No likeable characters here. Two stars.
9. Liber Amores by William Hazlitt - The Book of Love for losers and stalkers. Hazlitt's true tale of woeful, unrequited love for a servant girl. Of Human Bondage on steroids. Poor Hazlitt. Two and a half stars.
* Notable exception for Heart of Darkness. That seemed more like a Faulkner tale, and I don’t mean that as a compliment. Although I loved the delightful A Rose for Emily. Which was so unFaulker-like! More Nathaniel Hawthorne...
1. Life of Richard Savage by Samuel Johnson - The story about a born loser, and the most boring, depressing read in this collection. No stars.
2. Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth - Another story about an ineffectual man, actually generations of them. Two stars.
3. The Room in the Dragon Volant by Sheridan Joseph Le Fanu - Count on Le Fanu to give us his usual, predictable gothic yarn, engaging only because of his precise gift for atmosphere and setting--I'm bound to confuse this as a movie someday, with a strapping Stewart Granger in the lead role of yet another ineffectual man (surely I can't be the only reader who saw what was coming, early on!). Three stars.
4. Cousin Phillis by Mrs. Gaskell - A story that narrowly escaped being a tragedy. Reading it reminded me of Thomas Hardy's Far from the Madding Crowd. All decent, sincere characters here, the only antagonist being great expectations (and I don't mean mine). Two and half stars.
5. The Lifted Veil by George Eliot - I detect none of the magic that endeared Middlemarch to me here. Depressing, certainly. Dispirited bildungsroman of a weakling. Two stars.
6. The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad - This started out slow, as benign as the windless bay where the narrative takes place. But what an exhilarating finish! I haven’t read much of Conrad's work, but the few I've read* I hold dear: Lord Jim, Typhoon, and now this. Onboard are the Joseph Conrad refrains I’ve come to recognize: second chances and ambiguous heroes. Anti-heroes. But—was this a ghost story? Of doppelgangers? And was there a tinge of what once was the love that dare not speak its name? Five stars.
7. The Case of General Ople and Lady Camper by George Meredith - Much ado over not much. And behold, surely, the most ineffectual general ever to grace the fiction section. One star.
8. Nightmare Abbey by Thomas Love Peacock - A very toned-down As You Like It, it might as well be sepia. I think my brain processed it as a comic book while I was reading this. No likeable characters here. Two stars.
9. Liber Amores by William Hazlitt - The Book of Love for losers and stalkers. Hazlitt's true tale of woeful, unrequited love for a servant girl. Of Human Bondage on steroids. Poor Hazlitt. Two and a half stars.
* Notable exception for Heart of Darkness. That seemed more like a Faulkner tale, and I don’t mean that as a compliment. Although I loved the delightful A Rose for Emily. Which was so unFaulker-like! More Nathaniel Hawthorne...
July 21, 2008
This is not the exact book I'm reading. I Am readin " The Narrows" by Kenneth H Brown, which is a novel abotu bay ridge in the 1970's and the children who live in the neighborhood. It must e out of print because I don't see it here and I finnaly foudn it on ebay after two years of looking!
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews