Sister Carrie

Dreiser has written a magnificent work, holding up a mirror as it were, to so many aspects of life. His characters reflect every human experience imaginable - love, hate, hypocrisy, greed, lust, success, failure, poverty, envy, pride, humility, disappointment, hunger, deprivation of body and soul, the loss of everything one holds dear, the tragedy of unfulfilled dreams, the joys of fame and fortune, the eternal quest for the meaning of life, the search for true love. The story of a woman who flees country life for Chicago, Illinois and falls into a wayward life of sin. One of the most important novels America has ever produced, it ruthlessly exposes the hypocrisy and meanness of middle-class standards, and establishes a new tradition in literary realism.