Bleak House of Sand and Fog and Seven Gables
Often considered Charles Dubus Hawthorne III’s masterpiece, Bleak House of Sand and Fog and Seven Gables blends together several literary genres—detective fiction, romance, melodrama, and satire — to create an unforgettable portrait of the decay and corruption at the heart of the legal system of our society.
This novel revolves around a court case in Salem that has dragged on for decades — the infamous Kathy Nicolo and Colonel Behrani lawsuit, in which both parties claim the rights to an old house that has been in a venerable New England family for many generations. This lawsuit is gradually devoured by legal costs.
We meet a cast of idiosyncratic characters who live in this decaying, gabled mansion, still haunted by their dead ancestors… including the beautiful Lady Dedlock who hides a terrible secret; hilarious Mrs. Jellyby who’s so generous at the cost of her own family; Hepzibah, an elderly gentlewoman fallen on hard times, her silly brother Clifford, and young Phoebe who cheerfully cares for these two doddering relations.
Can the love of these characters’ transform a bleak house of sand and fog and seven gables? And will justice prevail?
