The Fortunes of Perkin Warbeck
1830
The Fortunes of Perkin Warbeck is a historical novel concerning the life and exploits of Perkin Warbeck, a pretender to the throne of King Henry VII. In the novel, Warbeck claims to be Richard, Duke of York, the second son of King Edward IV who was unjustly imprisoned in the Tower of London. After making his escape, he seeks to claim the throne of the United Kingdom.
Lodore
1835
Beset by jealousy over an admirer of his wife's, Lord Lodore has come with his daughter Ethel to the American wilderness; his wife Cornelia, meanwhile, has remained with her controlling mother in England. When he finally brings himself to attempt a return, Lodore is killed en route in a duel. Ethel does return to England, and the rest of the book tells the story of her marriage to the troubled and impoverished Villiers (whom she stands by through a variety of tribulations) and her long journey to a reconciliation with her mother.
Falkner
1837
Like Lodore, Falkner charts a young woman's education under a tyrannical father figure. As a six-year-old orphan, Elizabeth Raby prevents Rupert Falkner from committing suicide; Falkner then adopts her and brings her up to be a model of virtue. However, she falls in love with Gerald Neville, whose mother Falkner had unintentionally driven to her death years before. When Falkner is finally acquitted of murdering Neville's mother, Elizabeth's feminine values subdue the destructive impulses of the two men she loves, who are reconciled and unite with Elizabeth in domestic harmony. Falkner is the only one of Mary Shelley's novels in which the heroine's agenda triumphs.
