The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins (10 ebook reader .TXT) 📕
Description
The “Moonstone” of the title is a large but flawed diamond, looted from India at the time of the Mutiny by an unscrupulous British officer. Many years later, estranged from his family due to his licentious lifestyle, the officer bequeaths the diamond to his sister’s daughter, Rachel Verrinder, to be given to her on her 18th birthday. Due to the ill-omens surrounding the gem, this may have been an act of revenge rather than reconciliation. The diamond, it appears, was taken from a statue of the Moon God worshipped by a Hindu cult, and it has long been sought by a group of Brahmins determined to return it to their temple.
On the night of the birthday party the gem mysteriously disappears from Rachel’s room. While the first suspicions naturally fall on these Indians, they are eventually exculpated. Rachel becomes hysterical and angry when questioned about the theft and refuses to assist the police. Active efforts to assist them are taken up by Rachel’s cousin (and sweetheart) Franklin Blake. These efforts simply drive Rachel into further fury, and she becomes completely estranged from him. Suspicion thus falls on her as having some secret reason for wishing to raise money on the diamond. The novel proceeds to slowly uncover the mysteries involved.
Published in 1868, The Moonstone is often considered as one of the precursors of the modern detective novel, though this is a label which would not have been used by its author Wilkie Collins and his contemporaries. While it is true that the plot revolves around the mystery of a theft, and that it features Sergeant Cuff “in the Detective Force of Scotland Yard,” the novel is much more about character and relationships than the mere revelation of secrets. It also has a good dose of Collins’ humour, as the story is told in large part by eccentric characters such as the old house-steward Gabriel Betteredge who regards Robinson Crusoe as an oracle; and the ultra-religious Miss Clack, determined to convert everyone to her views.
Immensely popular at the time of its publication in serial form, The Moonstone is rightly considered to be one of Collins’ best works, and remains highly regarded today.
Read free book «The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins (10 ebook reader .TXT) 📕» - read online or download for free at americanlibrarybooks.com
- Author: Wilkie Collins
Read book online «The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins (10 ebook reader .TXT) 📕». Author - Wilkie Collins
See Betteredge’s Narrative, Chapter VIII ↩
Note: by Franklin Blake.—The writer is entirely mistaken, poor creature. I never noticed her. My intention was certainly to have taken a turn in the shrubbery. But, remembering at the same moment that my aunt might wish to see me, after my return from the railway, I altered my mind, and went into the house. ↩
Note.—Wherever the Report touches on the events of the birthday, or of the three days that followed it, compare with Betteredge’s Narrative, Chapters VIII to XIII ↩
ColophonThe Moonstone
was published in 1868 by
Wilkie Collins.
This ebook was produced for
Standard Ebooks
by
Jeffrey Kinross and David Grigg,
and is based on a transcription produced in 2006 by
John Hamm, David Widger, and The Online Distributed Proofreading Team
for
Project Gutenberg
and on digital scans available at the
Internet Archive and the HathiTrust Digital Library.
The cover page is adapted from
Study for “Portrait of an Indian”,
a painting completed in 1807 by
Anne Louis Girodet-Trioson.
The cover and title pages feature the
League Spartan and Sorts Mill Goudy
typefaces created in 2014 and 2009 by
The League of Moveable Type.
The first edition of this ebook was released on
December 2, 2017, 4:36 a.m.
You can check for updates to this ebook, view its revision history, or download it for different ereading systems at
standardebooks.org/ebooks/wilkie-collins/the-moonstone.
The volunteer-driven Standard Ebooks project relies on readers like you to submit typos, corrections, and other improvements. Anyone can contribute at standardebooks.org.
UncopyrightMay you do good and not evil.
May you find forgiveness for yourself and forgive others.
May you share freely, never taking more than you give.
Copyright pages exist to tell you can’t do something. Unlike them, this Uncopyright page exists to tell you, among other things, that the writing and artwork in this ebook are believed to be in the U.S. public domain. The U.S. public domain represents our collective cultural heritage, and items in it are free for anyone in the U.S. to do almost anything at all with, without having to get permission. Public domain items are free of copyright restrictions.
Copyright laws are different around the world. If you’re not located in the U.S., check with your local laws before using this ebook.
Non-authorship activities performed on public domain items—so-called “sweat of the brow” work—don’t create a new copyright. That means nobody can claim a new copyright on a public domain item for, among other things, work like digitization, markup, or typography. Regardless, to dispel any possible doubt on the copyright status of this ebook, Standard Ebooks L3C, its contributors, and the contributors to this ebook release this ebook under the terms in the CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication, thus dedicating to the worldwide public domain all of the work they’ve done on this ebook, including but not limited to metadata, the titlepage, imprint, colophon, this Uncopyright, and any changes or enhancements to, or markup on, the original text and artwork. This dedication doesn’t change the copyright status of the underlying works, which, though believed to already be in the U.S. public domain, may not yet be in the public domain of other countries. We make this dedication in the interest of enriching our global cultural heritage, to promote free and libre culture around the world, and to give back to the unrestricted culture that has given all of us so much.
Comments (0)