The Way We Live Now

Augustus Melmotte, a mysterious financier with a shady past in Europe, arrives in London and becomes the toast of society. Aristocrats who despise him crowd his parties, hoping to marry his daughter Marie and her fortune, or to grow rich from his scheme for a great American railway that may never be built, and he even stands for Parliament. Around him swarm the debts and intrigues of the Carbury family: the worthless young Sir Felix and his mother, Lady Carbury, a writer ready to flatter any critic.

Anthony Trollope wrote this long, angry satire after returning from abroad disgusted by what he called the commercial profligacy of the age, and it was published in 1875. Melmotte's bubble of credit, built on nothing but confidence, has made the novel strikingly relevant after every financial crash. Read the gentler The Warden for contrast.