The Trail of the Serpent

This was the first novel Mary Elizabeth Braddon ever published, and it helped invent a genre. Set in the grimy fictional town of Slopperton, the story follows Jabez North, a cold and ambitious schoolmaster who will commit any crime to rise, and Richard Marwood, a good-natured prodigal wrongly accused of murdering his uncle. Standing against the schemer is Mr. Peters, a mute police detective who cannot speak but reads guilt better than anyone, often counted among the earliest detectives in English fiction. Braddon spins a tangle of false identity, forgery, and violence, then slowly draws the noose tight around the real culprit. First issued in 1860 as Three Times Dead, it was revised and retitled a year later. Free PDF and EPUB editions are available here.