OLIVER TWIST. “Penguin English Library“

'A parish child - the orphan of a workhouse - the humble, half-starved drudge - to be cuffed and buffeted through the world, despised by all, and pitied by none'. After the brutal care of the workhouse, the orphan Oliver Twist falls into the more welcoming arms of a den of thieves. But the sinister Fagin's grip is not light, and life in the underworld where Oliver now finds himself often ends in a noose ...Mordantly funny, with some of the most memorably drawn characters in all of fiction - including the arch-villain Fagin, menacing Bill Sikes and the artful Dodger - Dickens' novel is a cutting social satire, imbued with a high moral sense and an air of threat and mystery.