Here’s another #SundayInTheStacks for those of you who miss touching old books. Let’s take a look at Charles Dickens’ great unfinished last work, The Mystery of Edwin Drood (1870).

Dickens’ novels were published in monthly parts—usually 20 but Drood only made it to 5. The distinctive blue-green wrappers helped customers recognize Dickens’ work in the shop windows. Other authors had other colors. Thackeray was yellow for example.

Parts cost only a shilling—the same cost as entrance to the Great Exhibition on a cheap day or lunch in a tavern—which made them affordable for many readers. Part of what made this cheap printing possible were, of course, the advertisements.

I confess I love the ads most of all—what an incredible window into Victorian life and culture. I use these in classes a lot: what can we deduce about Dickens’ earliest readers from these ads?

And each part includes 2 illustrations as well. Dickens first commissioned his son-in-law Charles Collins to illustrate Drood. He did the cover then fell ill. The rest were completed by Luke Fildes.