Through a Glass Darkly, Wilkie Collins
Through a Glass Darkly, Wilkie Collins
List: $16.00 | Sale: $11.20
Club: $8.00

Through a Glass Darkly
Strange Tales of Optical Distortion

Author: Wilkie Collins, Fitz James O'Brien, William Le Queux, Various Authors

Narrator: Cathy Dobson

Unabridged: 5 hr 10 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 10/30/2014


Synopsis

Seven strange stories of intriguing optical illusions.

The Diamond Lens by Fitz James O'Brien
The Devil's Spectacles by Wilkie Collins
The Secret of the Smoked Spectacles by William Le Queux
My Black Mirror by Wilkie Collins
The Man who was Blind by Edwin Pugh
A Coincidence by A. J. Alan
Titbottom’s Spectacles by George William Curtis

About Wilkie Collins

Wilkie Collins was an English novelist who critics often credit with the invention of the English detective novel. Sergeant Cuff from Collins's novel The Moonstone became a prototype of the detective hero in English fiction. Collins's works center on mainstream Victorian domestic life. Collins liked to tackle social issues, and many of his novels contain sympathetic portraits of physically abnormal individuals. In addition to Moonstone, he is well known for his popular suspense thriller The Woman in White, No Name, and Armadale.

Collins was born in London in 1824 to William Collins, a well-known landscape painter, and Harriet Collins, the daughter of a painter. Despite a secure home, he was a small, sickly child and had a slightly deformed skull. He was educated privately and studied painting for several years. He later studied law and became a lawyer at the age of twenty-seven. Collins never practiced law, but he did put his legal knowledge to work in his crime writing.

In 1851, Collins met his lifelong friend and mentor Charles Dickens while they were pursuing a mutual interest in amateur theater. Dickens helped Collins bring humor and believable characters into his books.The two women in Collins's life-Caroline Graves, his life-long companion, and Mrs. Martha Rudd, his mistress-also greatly influenced his writing.

During the 1860s, Collins started to suffer severely from rheumatic pains and became addicted to laudanum, a form of opium. The death of Dickens in 1870 robbed him of his powerful inspiration, and his popularity declined. In 1873, he met Mark Twain and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow on a trip to the United States. Soon thereafter he wrote The Evil Genius, which was published in 1886. Collins died from a stroke on September 23, 1889.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Alex is The Romance Fox on November 02, 2016

Donna Leon’s 15th book in her Commissario Brunetti Series and once again we are back in the beautiful city of Venice. It's springtime and Commissario Brunetti asked by his assistant, Vianello, to help him rescue his good friend who has being arrested for taking part in an environmental d......more

Goodreads review by Carol on August 22, 2007

I am hooked on Leon's series. Why? Her characters, and the powerfully visual way she evokes her environment. Commissario Brunetti , like all central detective characters, sets the tone of her works. He is human, humane, leads a normal home life, hates guns and violence, loves where he lives and depl......more

Goodreads review by Jane on May 29, 2013

One of the things, of many things, I like about Donna Leon's series with Commissario Brunetti is the wonderful family parts of the stories. Brunetti's wife is intelligent and passionate about her beliefs which are sometimes at odds with her husband's. The children are smart and articulate. And the f......more

Goodreads review by Bill on September 28, 2022

It's always comforting to enjoy a Commissario Brunetti mystery by Donna Leon. Through a Glass, Darkly is the 15th book in this excellent, entertaining series set in Venice, Italy. Brunetti and his right-hand man, Vianello, are asked to go help a friend of Vianello's, Marco Ribetti, who was arrested i......more

Goodreads review by Nancy on June 16, 2013

As I gambol through Donna Leon's series I realize what an admirable friend the would make. After every disappointing novel, I seem to seek out one of her books because I enjoy spending time with them, so I realized how much I would like her at my dinner table. She clearly enjoys a few drinks and a go......more