The Nether World

This is my very favorite Victorian novel and would definitely be in my top 3 of all time favorite books ever.

It is far more brutal, depressing, violent, miserable than anything Dickens wrote. The women characters break your heart, and the sense of hopelessness and despair never gives you a second respite. People starve, there is domestic violence, children die, people live in hovels that have more dust and dirt than furniture or bedding.

Thoroughly depressing and grim, but that is precisely why I love it so much. If you all turn away or pretend to be an ostrich, and make believe these things are not happening, nothing gets better.

I am a former caseworker for adoption and foster care, and we removed so many children from potential lives show more of horror, although the foster homes they went to often had a lot to be desired, as they were in the same neighborhoods where they were born. It was a color problem, which I can't expand upon here, but one that is quite sad, and if the problem did not exist, many more children would have been saved.

We are ( and should be ) our brother's keepers, especially when it comes to children who are suffering and dying daily, because want to ' mind their own business ' or ' not get involved '. show less

A fascinating story of late Victorian poverty in London . Like so many Victorian novels, it revolves around a will and issues of inheritance. The two central characters are a bit too good to be true and the villains are in the end not quite villainous enough which makes Gissing somewhat of acut price Dickens. Nevertheless, a thoroughly enjoyable novel.

If ever you feel that you lack something in your life, read and reflect on the characters in this book. The characters are only too real, in their time. The ugliest conditions of living, and the lowest poverty rules these unfortunate characyers' lives. Still, amidst all the spite that dwells in the hearts of most, there are two or three who dedicate the lighy in their hearts to easing the unhappiness on the lives of those around them. Read this book and find out for yourself; you won't be sorry.

Disheartening, realistic view of poverty and class struggle in 19th century England. Extremely readable. I think Gissing is terribly overlooked.