McTeague: A Story of San Francisco — Frank Norris

An early example of American realism, McTeague was considered truly shocking when first published in 1899.

This searing portrait of the downfall of a slow-witted dentist and his avaricious wife embodies Frank Norris's powerful insights into conflicting forces of heredity and social conditioning. It is a novel of compelling narrative force, resounding with a sense of life as epic.

As Kevin Starr points out in his introduction, McTeague continues to be regarded as a central statement of evolutionary awareness in late-nineteenth-century America and as a precursor of the works of such writers as Stephen Crane and Theodore Dreiser.