Invisible Woman: The Story of Nelly Ternan and Charles Dickens [Paperback]

Claire Tomalin (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In a remarkable feat of biographical sleuthing, Tomalin offers the fullest account to date of Charles Dickens's secret 13-year romance with actress Ellen ``Nelly'' Ternan. Photos.

Copyright 1992 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Paperback: 333 pages
• Publisher: Vintage; Reprint edition (December 1, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679738193
• ISBN-13: 978-0679738190
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #473,613 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Tomalin is a great biographer, March 20, 2000

By 

saliero (NSW Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Invisible Woman: The Story of Nelly Ternan and Charles Dickens (Paperback)

How many millions of words have been written about Charles Dickens? Many thousands in one famous biography alone (Ackroyd). Nelly Terman is there as the Mistress character in most of those, but what do we learn about Nelly? Nothing - until this biography.

It reads almost as a detective story as Tomalin uncovers not only the story of Terman-with-Dickens, but as much about Terman the woman as she can.

Highly recommended.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Kind of outdated, May 28, 2010

By 

Dr. Emily Kurtz (New York, NY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

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This review is from: Invisible Woman: The Story of Nelly Ternan and Charles Dickens (Paperback)

I think when this book came out, there was almost nothing known about Nell Ternan. But since I had already read the Slater bio, I felt a lot of the "info" in this book was redundant (non-sequentially, of course). Still, it makes for rather interesting reading, but nothing conclusive issues from it. In any case, you learn a lot about actors' lives at this period and about how Dickens presumably managed his double life (not to mention Collins and other writers who kept mistresses and alternate families safely hidden away).

An enjoyable read full of fun period details, but somehow, you come away a bit disappointed once it's all over with. And frankly, I found Nelly to be the least interesting of the sisters, and without Dickens, of almost no interest at all. Go figure. If you're a Victorianist, sure, read this book; if not, you may not really care about the Ternans and Dickens.