Bleak House / Dickens, Charles

Esther, the illegitinate child of Lady Dedlock and Captain Hawdon, is the ward of Mr. Jarndyce and lives with him at Bleak House.

Opening in the swirling mists of London, the novel revolves around a court case that has dragged on for decades?the infamous Jarndyce and Jarndyce lawsuit, in which an inheritance is gradually devoured by legal costs. As Dickens takes us through the case?s history, he presents a cast of characters as idiosyncratic and memorable as any he ever created, including the beautiful Lady Dedlock, who hides a shocking secret about an illegitimate child and a long-lost love; Mr. Bucket, one of the first detectives to appear in English fiction; and the hilarious Mrs.