The life and adventures of Michael Armstrong, the factory boy.

First Edition, First Issue, bound from parts. The parts were issued monthly from March 1839 to (presumably) February 1840. The book was published in the usual three-decker format in December 1839, and again as a single volume in March 1840. This parts issue has 4 leaves of prelims paged [i]–viii; the one-volume edition has an additional unpaginated leaf of prelims with a list of the illustrations.“Like Charles Dickens, Fanny was able to keep to a gruelling schedule, juggling two books at once, published in monthly instalments; for a time in the 1840s Dickens saw her as a serious rival. He even switched the plot midway through Nicholas Nickleby away from the Cheeryble brothers' factory when Fanny got in first with a damning exposé of child labour in her novel, Michael Armstrong, the Factory Boy ... This tale ... elicited a strong response from the critics. The Athenaeum (165, 1839, 587–90) claimed that Mrs Trollope was ‘scattering firebrands … among an ignorant and excited population to which her shilling numbers are but too accessible’” (ODNB).

8vo, pp. viii, 387, [1]. Contemporary red hard-grain morocco, covers ruled in gilt and blind, spine with wide raised bands decorated in gilt, lettered gilt, inner dentelles gilt, marbled endpapers, gilt edges. 24 engraved plates by Hervieu. Spine darkened, strong marks and indentations to back cover, plates foxed as usual, a good copy.