In a book club? Please take our annual Book Club Survey

Summary and Reviews of The Fraud by Zadie Smith

The Fraud by Zadie Smith

The Fraud

A Novel

by Zadie Smith
  • BookBrowse Review:
  • Critics' Consensus (6):
  • First Published:
  • Sep 5, 2023, 464 pages
  • Paperback:
  • Jun 2024, 0 pages
  • Rate this book

About This Book

Book Summary

From acclaimed and bestselling novelist Zadie Smith, a kaleidoscopic work of historical fiction set against the legal trial that divided Victorian England, about who gets to tell their story—and who gets to be believed

It is 1873. Mrs. Eliza Touchet is the Scottish housekeeper—and cousin by marriage—of a once-famous novelist, now in decline, William Ainsworth, with whom she has lived for thirty years.

Mrs. Touchet is a woman of many interests: literature, justice, abolitionism, class, her cousin, his wives, this life and the next. But she is also sceptical. She suspects her cousin of having no talent; his successful friend, Mr. Charles Dickens, of being a bully and a moralist; and England of being a land of facades, in which nothing is quite what it seems.

Andrew Bogle, meanwhile, grew up enslaved on the Hope Plantation, Jamaica. He knows every lump of sugar comes at a human cost. That the rich deceive the poor. And that people are more easily manipulated than they realize. When Bogle finds himself in London, star witness in a celebrated case of imposture, he knows his future depends on telling the right story.

The "Tichborne Trial"—wherein a lower-class butcher from Australia claimed he was in fact the rightful heir of a sizable estate and title—captivates Mrs. Touchet and all of England. Is Sir Roger Tichborne really who he says he is? Or is he a fraud? Mrs. Touchet is a woman of the world. Mr. Bogle is no fool. But in a world of hypocrisy and self-deception, deciding what is real proves a complicated task... .

Based on real historical events, The Fraud is a dazzling novel about truth and fiction, Jamaica and Britain, fraudulence and authenticity and the mystery of "other people."

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

BookBrowse Review

BookBrowse

One of Smith's gifts is for creating complicated characters who don't know themselves as well as they think they do. There are many overlapping power structures at play in The Fraud, and its characters are often unaware of their own position within them. But as always in Smith's work, there is no easy moral to the story – there are only people and the lives they inhabit...continued

Full Review (862 words)

This review is available to non-members for a limited time. For full access, become a member today.

(Reviewed by Grace Graham-Taylor).

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Beyond the Book



Women's Influence in the British Abolition Movement

Hannah MoreIn The Fraud, Eliza's lover Frances is a passionate abolitionist whose commitment to the cause infects Eliza with a similar sense of urgency. Britain's Slavery Abolition Act was passed in 1833, freeing at least 800,000 people from bondage in the Caribbean, South America, and Canada. The act followed decades of campaigns from abolitionist groups, who had been fighting to end the practice since the 1780s. An often-overlooked group who were influential in the fight to end slavery were women – figures such as Hannah More, Mary Prince, and Elizabeth Heyrick (whose house Eliza and Frances visit in The Fraud) were pivotal to the abolitionist cause.

Hannah More wrote pamphlets and poems which helped popularize the abolitionist cause in its...

This "beyond the book" feature is available to non-members for a limited time. Join today for full access.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

Read-Alikes Full readalike results are for members only

If you liked The Fraud, try these:

  • Prima Facie jacket

    Prima Facie

    by Suzie Miller

    Published 2025

    About this book

    Based on the Olivier and Tony Award-winning play, Suzie Miller's Prima Facie is an unforgettable story of what happens when a victim is asked to navigate a system that is not set up to accommodate the lived experience of sexual assault survivors.

  • Beyond the Door of No Return jacket

    Beyond the Door of No Return

    by David Diop

    Published 2024

    About this book

    More by this author

    The hotly anticipated new novel by David Diop, winner of the International Booker Prize.

We have 4 read-alikes for The Fraud, but non-members are limited to two results. To see the complete list of this book's read-alikes, you need to be a member.
More books by Zadie Smith
Search read-alikes
How we choose read-alikes
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

BookBrowse Book Club

  • Book Jacket
    Wandering Stars
    by Tommy Orange
    Tommy Orange follows There There with a powerful multi-generational story of survival and legacy.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    Three Days in June
    by Anne Tyler

    A new Anne Tyler novel destined to be an instant classic: a socially awkward mother of the bride navigates the days before and after her daughter's wedding.

  • Book Jacket

    Harlem Rhapsody
    by Victoria Christopher Murray

    The extraordinary story of the woman who ignited the Harlem Renaissance.

Who Said...

You can lead a man to Congress, but you can't make him think.

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

D to T N

and be entered to win..