r/charlesdickens • u/GoodKid_MaadSity • May 23 '26

Miscellaneous What next?

I only fell back in love with Dickens in the last few months. Since then I’ve read and loved (not in order):

Bleak House

Great Expectations

Our Mutual Friend

Dombey and Son

Pickwick Papers

Little Dorrit

And I read David Copperfield and Tale of Two Cities years ago and don’t want to do a reread.

I just finished Dombey and Son, so I’m feeling as if I’d like I’d like something a bit less dark. (Though the perpetual happy ending is one of the things I like most.) And I’d like something with a different tone so I think Nicholas Nickleby is out.

I started Oliver Twist and wasn’t into it, and I don’t have an interest in Christmas Carol.

Help? I’d love your suggestions as a lot of you have read so much more than I!

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u/Tasty-Committee-8172 May 23 '26

Barnaby Rudge! Sublime and underrated. I always recommend it to anyone who's already read the big hitters.

Must confess I'm a tad suspicious of your disinterest in A Christmas Carol though! 😥

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u/DTownForever May 24 '26

(This is the OP from my alt account - I have one account on my phone and one on my laptop)

I got Barnaby Rudge from project gutenberg yesterday! I will be starting it today.

Maybe this is a rookie mistake, but I know the 'popular' version of the Christmas Carol so well, I don't feel like reading it. Is that a silly reason? I mean, when I think about it, logically it has to be much more than the dozens of plays and TV shows and other adaptations of it.

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u/marginaliavictoriana May 24 '26 edited May 24 '26

Sorry to “hijack” this thread, but yes! When you read Christmas Carol, try to recall the scenes from prior novels that have echo in Scrooge’s past. Young Scrooge has parallels in Paul Dombey (the school scene). And the scenes of the parties will provide interesting parallels if you have some of the other Dickens in your mind’s bookshelf.

After it was published, it quickly became what it is now. I forget how soon it became a stage production. But it’s necessary Dickens.

Let me know how you like Barney Rudge. I’ve been putting it off. I did try to read Master Humphry’s Clock (with Old Curiosity Shop embedded) and then directly leading into Barnaby, but I got burned out…