FAGIN THE THIEF

A Dickensian world revisited.

Historical fiction writer Epstein rescues Dickens’ Fagin from his reputation as a slimy character who exploits orphans, training them in thievery in the clotted, filthy streets of Victorian London. Epstein’s Jacob Fagin is a lonely, emotionally wounded man; a master pickpocket to be sure, but also a victim of virulent antisemitism from all classes of English society, which treats the “skinny red-haired Jew” as vermin. Growing up in poverty in a Jewish enclave with a vigilant, caring mother, he takes Hebrew lessons with a neighborhood rabbi in the mornings, and, by the time he’s 11, wheedles his way into becoming the apprentice to a deft, gaudy pickpocket. It’s a skill, he realizes, “he must learn by doing,” and soon practice perfects his sleight of hand. He’s 16 when his mother dies, succumbing to whatever pestilence has swept through their mean streets—cholera, typhus, consumption, scarlet fever, influenza—and he’s left homeless. Epstein traces his fortunes and misfortunes as he manages to survive, settling into an abandoned building that becomes a refuge for orphans and runaways who want to learn his trade: Jack Dawkins, known as the Artful Dodger; Toby Crackit; Charley Bates; briefly, Oliver Twist; and the incorrigible Bill Sikes, who’s fled an abusive, alcoholic father. Sikes graduates from pickpocket to housebreaker, from a swaggering boy to a violent man so filled with anger that Jacob comes to fear for his life. Epstein captures the bravado and vulnerabilities of Jacob’s motley crew of orphans, and the gritty ambience of the alleys, cellars, and seedy pubs they inhabit. She brings to her portrait of Fagin—and even Sikes—a tenderness and empathy that renders them as palpable: men, haunted by loss, longing to be loved.

Vivid characters populate a riveting narrative.