Middlemarch

<b>From A to Z the Penguin Drop Caps series collects 26 unique hardcovers--featuring cover art by type superstar Jessica Hische </b> <p/>It all begins with a letter. Fall in love with Penguin Drop Caps a new series of twenty-six collectible and gift-worthy hardcover editions each with a type cover showcasing a gorgeously illustrated letter of the alphabet by superstar type designer Jessica Hische whose work has appeared everywhere from Tiffany & Co. to Wes Anderson's film <i>Moonrise Kingdom</i> to Penguin's own bestsellers <i>Committed</i> and <i>Rules of Civility</i>. A collaboration between Jessica Hische and Penguin Art Director Paul Buckley the series design encompasses foil-stamped paper-over-board cases in a rainbow-hued spectrum across all twenty-six book spines and a decorative stain on all three paper edges. Penguin Drop Caps debuts with an A for Jane Austen's <i>Pride and Prejudice</i> a B for Charlotte Brontë's <i>Jane Eyre</i> and a C for Willa Cather's <i>My Ántonia</i> and continues with more classics from Penguin. <p/><b>E is for Eliot.</b> Considered one the masterpieces of realist fiction George Eliot's novel <i>Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life</i> explores a fictional nineteenth-century Midlands town in the midst of modern changes. The proposed Reform Bill promises political change; the building of railroads alters both the physical and cultural landscape; new scientific approaches to medicine incite public division; and scandal lurks behind respectability. The quiet drama of ordinary lives and flawed choices are played out in the complexly portrayed central characters of the novel--the idealistic Dorothea Brooke; the ambitious Dr. Lydgate; the spendthrift Fred Vincy; and the steadfast Mary Garth. The appearance of two outsiders further disrupts the town's equilibrium--Will Ladislaw the spirited nephew of Dorothea's husband the Rev. Edward Casaubon and the sinister John Raffles who threatens to expose the hidden past of one of the town's elite. <i>Middlemarch</i> displays George Eliot's clear-eyed yet humane understanding of characters caught up in the mysterious unfolding of self-knowledge.