Charles Dickens's first historical novelset during the anti-Catholic riots of 1780is an unparalleled portrayal of the terror of a rampaging mob seen through the eyes of the individuals swept up in the chaos.

Those individuals include Emma a Catholic and Edward a Protestant whose forbidden love weaves through the heart of the story; and the simpleminded Barnaby one of the riot leaders whose fate is tied to a mysterious murder and whose beloved pet raven Grip embodies the mystical power of innocence. The story encompasses both the rarified aristocratic world and the volatile streets and nightmarish underbelly of London which Dickens characteristically portrays in vivid pulsating detail. But the real focus of the book is on the riots themselves depicted with an extraordinary energy and redolent of the dangers the mindlessness and the possibilitiesboth beneficial and brutalof the mob.

One of the lesser-known novels Barnaby Rudge is nonetheless among the most brilliantand most terrifyingin Dickens's oeuvre