Wilkie Collins

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Just read, 'No Name' and thoroughly enjoyed it. Has anybody read it? He is a much, much better writer than Dickens (they were friends) and I think liked women much more than CD did too!

Woman in White is one of my favourite books ever and have read several of his other books, but not no name. Great writer.

'The Woman In White' is also one of my favourites and I loved 'The Moonstone.' Have read a couple of novellas too and now intend to read everything else he wrote!

I love Woman in White and The Moonstone and No Name, but I think his absolute best is Armadale. Lydia Gwilt is one of the great Victorian anti-heroines.

Yes yes to Armadale. My favourite book ever - Lydia is just brilliant.

I haven't read it - it's now on my list, ta. :)

I loved No Name - I remember thinking that the heroine (sorry can't remember her name) was a great, flawed, character. Dickens would have killed her off or made her live in a nunnery but wc gave her a happy ending. I liked that.

I really enjoyed No Name. The main character is so feisty! Wilkie Collins' women are great, apart from that dreadful drip Laura Fairlie.

TWIW is an amazing book. It's just a shame that the 'secret' when it finally comes out is so underwhelming to a modern reader (I went 'huh? what's the big deal?', but that clearly wasn't Wilkie Collins' fault!

The Woman in White is one of my very favourite books, the ultimate page turner. Marian Holcombe is such an amazing character, one of the best female protagonists, and Count Fosco............he's a bit fat and evil and keeps mice in his pockets but such a brilliant baddie.

Laura is a pathetic drip.

Agree that Collins is a superior talent to Dickens.

Haven't read Armadale or No Name. Now can't wait.

I really enjoyed No Name as well, and have not read Armandale yet, so will put that on my list. WC seems like a much more 'modern' writer than Dickens, who I also enjoy, but seemed to have an inability to create decent heroines. I especially enjoyed WC's description of an early Alburgh, and the desperately respectable, newly built Victorian suburb.

Great thread. I have never enjoyed Dickens but love Wilkie Collins. TWIW is such a good read.

I suspect that CD didn't like women much, and didn't like anybody (male or female) as much as he liked himself. He treated his wife astonishingly badly iirc.

I think Wilkie Collins divided his time between two women in his life, neither of whom he married, but had children whom he acknolwedged with both. I suppose this inspired No Name which attacks the lack of rights awarded to illegitimate children.

I agree that Dickens probably didn't like women much as we can see from both his personal life and his inability/disinclination to create strong female characters.

I think he had children with one of them, and the other one already had a daughter who he treated as his own. He was also addicted to laudanum (sp?) iirc.

but sqoosh there are many strong female characters in Dickens, it's just that he didn't write the central heroines as strong characters. but think, how many of the male central characters ...Nicholas Nickleby, Oliver Twist, Charles Darnay for example are, let's face it, boring as well?

Woman in White recommendation here to.

I read, A Rogue's Life' last night, which I had never even heard of. Great fun.