Publisher and Publication Date: MacMillan Collector’s Library. February 13, 2018.
Genre: Fiction.
Pages: 184.
Source: Library.
Rating: Very Good.

Amazon
The Kindle edition is $1.24.

For the full edition of Sketches by Boz, Penguin Classic.

Scenes of London Life is a perfect gift book. It is the length of my small hand (6.2 inches.) It has a lovely front and back cover. A light blue ribbon is sewn-in for easy use. The book easily fits in a purse, or backpack. For a Dickens fan, this is a great gift for a graduate, or Mother’s Day, or Father’s Day.
Twelve chapters are included that are excerpts from the Charles Dickens book, Sketches by Boz.
J.B. Priestly wrote the introduction. It’s a solid introduction piece on the book, and also the man and works of Charles Dickens. The introduction shows Dickens’ personality and writing style. It shares the reason for this bite size book.
Illustrations are included in the book by George Cruikshank. Cruickshank was a “British artist, caricaturist, and illustrator.” If you click on the highlighted name in the previous sentence, you can read an interesting biography from Britannica.
One of my favorite chapters is “A Visit To Newgate”. Newgate was a prison in London. Dickens is probably the most descriptive writer of fiction stories. It is a huge reason why I love his books. David Copperfield is my number one favorite book of Dickens. In the story, “A Visit To Newgate”, Dickens gave me a panoramic view of the prison and occupants. Then, he gave me a close-up view by showing a relationship between a mother and daughter. Their mannerisms, facial expressions, and how they respond to one another is captured. Dickens made a point of showing how the different classes of people are segregated even in a prison. The respectable class was confined in a separate area from the “other” people.
Dickens is king for long sentences:

There are strange chords in the human heart, which will lie dormant through years of depravity and wickedness, but which will vibrate at last to some slight circumstance apparently trivial in itself, but connected by some undefined and indistinct association, with past days that can never be recalled, and with bitter recollections from which the most degraded creature in existence cannot escape. Page 108.

Sixty-one words in one sentence!