Written by one of the world's leading literary theorists, this book provides a wide-ranging, accessible and humorous introduction to the English novel from Daniel Defoe to the present day. It covers the works of major authors, including Daniel Defoe, Henry Fielding, Samuel Richardson, Laurence Sterne, Walter Scott, Jane Austen, the Brontes, Charles Dickens, George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, Henry James, Joseph Conrad, Virginia Woolf, D.H. Lawrence and James Joyce.

Smooth-talking, sensual and self-deluded, Gregory Riding leads an existence of formidable foppishness, his days and nights a series of effortless, titillating conquests and tireless sex - sister, employers, acquaintances are but co-stars among a cast of thousands to have passed through his busy bed. His foster brother, Terry, has to make do with the leavings as he trawls through life in a miasma of grief, burdened by an unmentionable past and the unlikelihood of ever having a good time in bed...

Yolanda Garcia is taking a trip to the Dominican Republic to revisit the country where she was born, and which her family was forced to flee for New York when she was a child. Previously privileged and wealthy, the family finds it hard to adjust to immigrant life in the Bronx, particularly their tough old-world father, Papi. As they try immerse themselves in the American way of life, Yolanda and her three sisters begin to rebel against Papi's traditions and values, each in their own way.

But,...