The Moonstone

Perfect for long, cold, winter evenings * The Times *
A whodunit about a lost jewel with several different narrators 'the first English detective story' is so ingenious, so melodramatically rational, so druggy and glittery and cleverly elusive, that it triumphs over all its impersonators * Observer *
A great, bold, theatrical mystery story which never falters, written with huge confidence and style -- Joanna Trollope
Wilkie Collins, along with Arthur Conan Doyle and Charles Dickens is generally acknowledged to be the great-great-grandfather of the modern mystery, but it's hard to think of many modern mysteries as skillfully shaped and psychologically keen as this one. The story flirts with the conventions of Victorian melodrama, but the characters that people it are truly vivid -- Elizabeth Kostova
No wonder 21st-century novelists are influenced by the great Victorian serial writers with their rip-roaring plots. A twisting detective thriller -- Joanna Briscoe * Independent *