Mary Elizabeth Braddon

<p> An important figure in the development of crime fiction Mary Elizabeth Braddon (1835-1915) wrote more than 80 novels numerous plays poems essays and short stories and edited two magazines during her 55-year literary career. Her bestselling <I>Lady Audley's Secret</I> secured her reputation as a leading sensation novelist. Though critics called her work immoral Braddon's novels influenced the detective fiction of the late Victorian period. With entries on all her published writing characters relationships and influences and themes and contexts as well as numerous illustrations a career chronology and a chronological and alphabetical listing of all of her works this companion to Braddon's mystery fiction is the definitive reference on this provocative but overlooked writer.</p>