Subject
Illegitimate children -- Fiction Books
Best books
Nathaniel Hawthorne
The Scarlet Letter
"The Scarlet Letter" by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a historical novel published in 1850. Set in Puritan Massachusetts during the 1640s, it follows Hester Prynne, who bears a child out of wedlock and must wear a scarlet "A" as punishment for adultery. While she refuses to name the father, her long-lost husband arrives in town seeking revenge. The story explores themes of sin, guilt, and redemption as secrets threaten to destroy lives in this unforgiving community.
Charles Dickens
Bleak House
"Bleak House" by Charles Dickens is a novel published between 1852 and 1853. At its center lies Jarndyce and Jarndyce, an endless legal case in the Court of Chancery involving conflicting wills. The story follows Esther Summerson, an orphan with a mysterious past, and Lady Dedlock, an aristocrat harboring a dangerous secret. As a lawyer investigates Lady Dedlock's hidden connection to a deceased pauper, multiple lives become entangled in the grinding machinery of the law, leading to revelation, illness, murder, and tragedy in fog-shrouded London.
Thomas Hardy
Jude the Obscure
"Jude the Obscure" by Thomas Hardy is a novel published in 1895. It follows Jude Fawley, a working-class stonemason who dreams of becoming a scholar at Christminster. His ambitions become entangled with his passionate but troubled relationship with his cousin, Sue Bridehead. Through failed marriages, social ostracism, and personal tragedy, the novel explores the crushing weight of Victorian society's institutions—particularly marriage, religion, and class barriers—on those who dare to defy convention.
E. M. (Edward Morgan) Forster
Howards End
"Howards End" by E. M. Forster is a novel published in 1910. Three families collide in turn-of-the-century England: the wealthy capitalist Wilcoxes, the intellectual Schlegel sisters, and the struggling working-class Basts. When idealistic Margaret Schlegel befriends the Wilcox matriarch, a deathbed wish concerning the country house Howards End sets off a chain of events involving concealed inheritances, broken engagements, financial ruin, and forbidden affairs. Their intertwined fates will ultimately determine who inherits England's social future.
George Eliot
Adam Bede
"Adam Bede" by George Eliot is a novel first published in 1859. Set in the rural community of Hayslope in 1799, it follows a love entanglement among four characters: the virtuous carpenter Adam Bede, the beautiful but vain Hetty Sorrel, the charming young squire Arthur Donnithorne, and the devout Methodist preacher Dinah Morris. When forbidden attraction leads to seduction and devastating consequences, the story unfolds into tragedy involving child murder, guilt, and the search for redemption in a close-knit pastoral world.
William Faulkner
The sound and the fury
"The sound and the fury" by William Faulkner is a novel published in 1929. The story follows the declining Compson family of Jefferson, Mississippi, told through multiple perspectives including stream of consciousness narration. The family consists of three brothers—Quentin, Benjamin, and Jason—and their sister Caddy, along with their black servant Dilsey. Through fragmented narratives spanning childhood trauma to adult consequences, the novel explores family decay, disability, honor, and loss across different time periods in the early twentieth century.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
The Scarlet Letter
"The Scarlet Letter" by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a historical novel published in 1850. Set in Puritan Massachusetts during the 1640s, it follows Hester Prynne, who bears a child outside marriage and must wear a scarlet "A" as punishment for adultery. While Hester refuses to name the father, her long-lost husband arrives in disguise, vowing revenge. The story explores sin, guilt, and redemption as secrets threaten to destroy lives in this unforgiving community.
Mrs. Rowson
Charlotte Temple
"Charlotte Temple" by Mrs. Rowson is a novel originally published in England in 1791. It tells the story of fifteen-year-old Charlotte Temple, a schoolgirl seduced by a British officer who persuades her to run away with him to America. There, abandoned while pregnant and penniless, Charlotte faces devastating consequences. The novel became a bestseller in America, going through over 200 editions, and belongs to the seduction novel genre that captivated early American readers with its cautionary tale of youthful innocence betrayed.
Henry Wood
East Lynne
"East Lynne" by Mrs. Henry Wood is a sensation novel published in 1861. This Victorian bestseller follows Lady Isabel Vane, who loses everything when her father dies and makes a fateful decision to abandon her husband and children for an aristocratic seducer. When betrayal leads to tragedy, Isabel returns in disguise as a governess in her former husband's household, now married to another woman. The novel explores themes of infidelity, identity, and the devastating consequences of impulsive choices in a tale of melodrama and moral reckoning.
Compton MacKenzie
Sinister Street, vol. 1
"Sinister Street, vol. 1" by Compton Mackenzie is a novel published in 1913. This coming-of-age story follows Michael Fane and his sister Stella, two children born out of wedlock to wealthy parents in an era when such circumstances carried deep social stigma. The novel traces Michael's development from a precocious boy through his experiences at prep school and Oxford, capturing the texture of early twentieth-century English life with lavish detail and unflinching confidence.
E. M. (Edward Morgan) Forster
Howards End
"Howards End" by E. M. Forster is a novel published in 1910 about social conventions and relationships in turn-of-the-century England. Three families collide: the wealthy, conventional Wilcoxes; the intellectual Schlegel sisters; and the struggling Basts. When idealistic Margaret Schlegel befriends the Wilcox matriarch, she becomes entangled in questions of inheritance, class prejudice, and betrayal. As romantic connections and hidden secrets emerge, the fates of all three families intertwine around the country house called Howards End—a symbol of England's uncertain social future.
Compton MacKenzie
Sinister Street, vol. 2
"Sinister Street, vol. 2" by Compton Mackenzie is the second volume of a novel published in 1914. This Bildungsroman follows Michael Fane and his sister Stella, two children born out of wedlock to wealthy parents in Edwardian England. The novel traces Michael's development from boyhood through his experiences at Oxford and into sophisticated young adulthood, capturing a vanished generation with lavish detail. This second volume continues the journey begun in the first, exploring themes of identity, social class, and coming of age.
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