Moll Flanders – Daniel Defoe

"I grew as impudent a Thief, and as dexterous, as ever Moll Cut-Purse was."

Born in Newgate Prison, Moll Flanders navigates a tumultuous life through five marriages (once to her own brother), twelve years as a whore, eight years as a transported felon in Virginia, and a career as a successful thief. Despite her crimes and misfortunes, she remains a resilient, witty, and surprisingly sympathetic narrator who survives by her wits in a harsh world.

Defoe's picaresque novel is one of the first great English novels. It offers a vivid, gritty, and unjudgmental portrait of the criminal underworld and the limited options available to women in the 17th century.