Much of Mary Shelley’s life reads like a compilation of some of the most lurid and sensationalist novels of her time. After the stormy years of her relationship with Percy Shelley, Mary went on to raise her one surviving son on her own, never sure of the loyalty of friends, threatened and intimidated by her dead husband’s father. John Williams offers a thoughtful assessment of her literary achievement, set against the background of the evolution of the English novel in the politically volatile years of the early-19th century.