Charles Palliser

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Charles Palliser (born 1947) is an American-born, British-based novelist.

In the 1970s and 1980s, he lectured in modern literature and creative writing at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow and Rutgers University in New Jersey. During this time, he wrote two plays and, over a period of twelve years, his epic first novel The Quincunx.

Published in 1989, The Quincunx was a surprise hit. Set in 19th century England, it charts the fortunes over a number of years of a single mother and her young son, through the eyes of the latter. Through a complex web of scheming and conspiracies by relatives and others, they fall from relative wealth to poverty and eventual destitution. The book is notable for its accurate and evocative portrayal of English life at the time, covering the breadth of society from the gentry to the poor and from provincial villages to metropolitan London and dealing with the eccentricities of Victorian English land law. Towards the end of the book it is revealed that the narrator may not be as objective as the reader probably assumes.

Palliser has subsequently published two more novels and one collection of short stories.