When Mr and Mrs Vanstone are killed in an accident, an understandable oversight and the misogynistic vagaries of Victorian law have left their daughters, Magdalen and Norah, orphaned and penniless.

But by then Mrs Lecount has also bullied him into drawing up a desperately complicated will with obfuscating clauses and a Secret Trust. And, as with other Collins’ works, No Name is a deep, complicated, intriguing, suspenseful novel despite its hefty length (over seven hundred pages). Written in the early 1860s, between The Woman in White and The Moonstone, No Name was rejected as immoral by critics of its time, but is today regarded as a novel of outstanding social insight, showing Collins at the height of his powers. This story showcased several memorable characters: Magdalen, the beautiful, headstrong, and indomitable heroine; Captain Wragge, her maternal uncle, a clever, scheming but likeable rogue who helped her for his own gains; Mrs. Tan solo un par de personajes me gustaron realmente, entre los que destaco sin duda al MARAVILLOSO Capitán Wragge, por su mera presencia, las 700 páginas de este libro merecen la pena, ¡Porque menudo personajazo!She meets with a Captain Wragge, a shirttail relative, who makes no bones about his being a swindler.

Mercurial and unscrupulous, Magdalen is Wilkie Collins's most exhilarating heroine, one of the rare subversives in Victorian fiction and a woman dazzlingly versatile in her powers of self-transformation. Loads of people love Collins, especially The Moonstone, but I’ve never been able to get enthusiastic about him. The modern society though cannot condone her conduct, for no decent society can sanction deception, would understand Magdalen better; would appreciate the circumstances that drove her to act as she did. He is studied widely; new film, television, and radio versions of some of his books have been made; and all of his letters have been published. While I’ve read Collins’s more famous The Woman in White and The Moonstone, both several times, I hadn’t read the other two of what are considered his four major sensation novels: No Name and Armadale.

After reading these two most famous novels of Collins, I wanted to read some of his lesser known stories. The money goes to their father’s estranged brother, Michael Vanstone, who resolutely refuses to help them. At its heart are two sisters, Norah and the main protagonist Magdalen, who have been brought up in a Somerset country house. Me quedo con esa crítica a la sociedad victoriana, con el inicio, el final de la historia, y por supuesto, con el Capitán Wragge. There are so many twists and turns it makes you dizzy, but every one has a purpose and leads somewhere.

This is a good book with an attention-getting suspenseful drama, not as good as his “Moonstone” and “Lady in White,” or even “The Hunted Hotel,” all of which are superb dramas that begin with unusual episodes, but it is still good and an enjoyment to read. As often the case with a Collins novel, No Name takes on various staples of the author: relevant themes and key moral issues of his day in a serialized format. All the above would have failed however to make this book a fascinating read if it wasn't combined with Collins's beautiful prose and his sensitive and sincere writing.

Scene One begins in 1846, at Combe-Raven in West Somerset, the country residence of the wealthy Vanstone family: Andrew Vanstone, his wife, and their two daughters. The older sister accepts her fate and sets out to earn her living, the younger sister does the opposite. This woman, even though according to the laws of Victorian England she was born with “no name”, will stop at nothing to ensure that her father’s inheritance is hers. Vanstone is worried by Mrs Lecount’s vague threats, and he agrees with Wragge to marry Magdalen in secret.