Wilkie Collins remains most famous for his novels The Moonstone and The Woman in White, in which he pioneered a new style of sensation writing, the influence of which can still be seen in today's culture in the genres of crime, mystery and suspens. He is also renowned for his close relationship with Charles Dickens, who regarded him as the most talented of his many protégés.

When Rachel Verinder's legacy of a priceless Indian diamond is stolen, all the evidence indicates that it is her beloved, Franklin Blake, who is guilty. Around this central axis of crime and thwarted love, Collins constructs an ingenious plot of teasing twists and surprises, and an elaborate multi-voiced narrative that sustains the tension all the way to its stunning ending.

Described by T.S. Eliot as the first, the longest and the best of modern English detective novels, Wilkie Collins's The Moonstone is an important precursor of the modern mystery and suspense genres.

The Moonstone is the first, the longest and the best of modern English detective novels.

Probably the very finest detective story ever written.

You can't help feeling that Wilkie Collins was more in tune with modernity than his friend Charles Dickens.