The Woman in White

I loved this mystery. Very immersive.

Enjoyed this so much! Not a light read but I completely embraced the Victorian writing. Loved the word-full character descriptions. The mystery had me reading well into the early hours. A must-read for historical influence on future writers of mystery genre.

Haven't not sure what to expect about this book cuz I know it was an old classic which I love but this book was a really good there's lots of twists and turn just kind of like a little mystery thriller which are my favorite so I highly recommend you read it or listen to it on Audible the guy that that reads it on Audible is awesome I love his voice

Beautifully written, engaging mystery, heroic characters

Who is the mysterious, young woman in white who suddenly touches the arm of Walter Hartright while walking alone at night in London? This question is at the root of this richly rewarding Victorian drama, considered the forerunner of the entire detective genre. Is the woman in white, who has admitted to escaping from an asylum, truly a lunatic, or is she a prisoner locked up for the dark secrets she knows about a powerful man?

The mystery of the woman's identity becomes completely entangled with the story of the engagement of young Laura Fairlie to Sir Percival Glyde, desperately in need of Laura's fortune. Laura's half-sister, Marian Halcolme, is a central character throughout the drama, suspecting Glyde's truly sinister character and desperately trying to prevent the ill-fated marriage. She also suspects a connection between the woman in white and her half-sister. So does Walter Hartright, who had been hired to teach both sisters the art of drawing and painting, and who fell in love with Laura right away. Marian and Walter form a close alliance in trying to solve the mystery of the woman in white and her possible connection to Laura and Sir Percival Glyde, while also trying to protect Laura from the efforts by Glyde and his Italian friend and advisor, Count Fosco, to separate Laura from her fortune.

You've got to enjoy the exceptionally long novels that were the style of this period, otherwise, you'll become impatient for faster movement. But in the mid-19th century, long novels were serialized in magazines, includng many of Charles Dickens' own novels. Dickens and Wilkie Collins were colleagues, fellow actors, and friends, and Dickens serialized The Woman in White as well as Moonstone in his magazine, All Year Round. Readers back in those days had plenty of patience to read long descriptions of persons, outfits, room furnishings, landscapes, and the menu at formal dinner parties.

One of Collins' innovations is in writing his novels from the perspectives of multiple characters. It is hugely enjoyable to get to know each character in depth in this way. Each writes from the heart and reveals more about themselves than even an omniscient narrator would have been able to do without it becoming awkward and overdone.

Note the Victorian literary device of giving characters names that suit them: Laura Fairlie is more than fairlie innocent and beautiful; Walter Hartright's heart is in the right place; Sir Percival Glyde relies on the evil machincations of his friend, Count Fosco, to glide through life at the expense of others.

I am indebted to a reviewer known as Jason for including these best lines about women from his own review, and I hope he takes it as a compliment that I borrow them here:
1. Women can resist a man's love, a man's fame, a man's personal appearance, and a man's money; but they cannot resist a man's tongue, when he knows how to talk to them. Marian's diary (p. 258)
2. "Human ingenuity, my friend, has hitherto only discovered two ways in which a man can manage a woman. One way is to knock her down--a method largely adopted by the brutal lower orders of the people, but utterly abhorrent to the refined and educated classes above them. The other way (much longer, much more difficult, but, in the end, not less certain) is never to accept a provocation at a woman's hands. It holds with animals, it holds with children, and it holds with women, who are nothing but children grown up." Evil Fosco (p.327)
3. "Where, in the history of the world, has a man of my order ever been found without a woman in the background, self-immolated on the altar of his life?" Evil Fosco (p. 629)