The Quincunx

An extraordinary modern novel in the Victorian tradition, Charles Palliser has created something extraordinary-a plot within a plot within a plot of family secrets, mysterious clues, low-born birth, high-reaching immorality, and, always, always the fog-enshrouded, enigmatic character of 19th century-London itself. "So compulsively absorbing that reality disappears . . . One is swept along by those enduring emotions that defy modern art and a random universe: hunger for revenge, longing for justice and the fantasy secretly entertained by most people that the bad will be punished and the good rewarded."-The New York Times "A virtuoso achievement . . . It is an epic, a tour de force, a staggeringly complex and tantalizingly layered tale that will keep readers engrossed in days. . . . The Quincunx will not disappoint you. It is, quite simply, superb."-Chicago Sun-Times "A bold and vivid tale that invites the reader to get lost in the intoxicating rhythms of another world. And the invitation is irresistible."-San Francisco Chronicle "A remarkable book . . . In mood, color, atmosphere and characters, this is Charles Dickens reincarnated . . . It is an immersing experience."-Los Angeles Times Book Review "To read the first pages is to be trapped for seven-hundred odd more: you cannot stop turning them."-The New Yorker "Few books, at most a dozen or two in a lifetime, affect us this way. . . . For sheer intricacy and ingenuity, for skill and clarity of storytelling, it is the kind of book readers wait for, a book to get lost in."-The Philadelphia Inquirer