"My Novel"

This sharp, satirical opening mocks the fashionable "march of Enlightenment" while making a darker claim: intelligence is not the same as virtue. Brilliant minds may be dangerous when conscience, sympathy, faith, and self-restraint are absent, and the novel quickly widens from social wit into a study of intellect in modern life. As parliament reconvenes after a close election, Audley Egerton narrowly survives defeat and the stage is set for fresh ambitions, rivalries, and political maneuvering. Against that backdrop, Count Giulio di Peschiera emerges as a polished but ruthless schemer, trapped by debt and obsessed with recovering power through marriage, inheritance, and imperial favor. His tense exchanges with his sister Beatrice expose a family bound by loyalty, coercion, and betrayal, and Beatrice's rebellion against lifelong humiliation reveals the cost of dependence in a world ruled by money and advantage. In London, the calculating Randal Leslie quietly probes society's secrets, encourages Frank Hazeldean's hopes for the Marchesa di Negra, and manipulates him into silence about Riccabocca, all while nursing his own ambitions and memories of lost family greatness. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.