Lady Audley's Secret - Mary Elizabeth Braddon (1835- 1915)
A Classic Sensation Novel ' Lady Audley's Secret' (first installments in 1861- completed in 1862) is both a Victorian 'bigamy' and 'sensation' novel. Charlotte Bronte's 'Jane Eyre' ( 1847) is the prime example of the former, with poor Jane in church all set to become Mrs Rochester, only to discover that husband to be already has an insane wife shut up in the attic. In 'Lady Audley's Secret' and the next Braddon novel 'Aurora Floyd' (1864), it is in fact the leading female characters that have committed bigamy, both deceiving second husbands. Braddon accepted that these two books were ' bigamy novels' . EDWARDS As for a definition of 'sensation' novels, t...