This is how we live now

For the first time in Russian (not counting archaic and shortened translations of the 19th century) — one of the main novels of the British classic, whose contemporary popularity in the English-speaking world can only be compared to the fame of Jane Austen (and Charles Dickens). «Trollope kills me with his mastery,» wrote Leo Tolstoy in his diary. Augustus Melmotte, Esquire, arrives in London from Paris, owning a rumored vast fortune, capable of «bidding up or down any company through buying and selling shares», or even lifting or lowering the national currency exchange rate at his discretion; the financier's past is shrouded in mystery, but it is said that «he allegedly built a railway across all of Russia, supplied the southern army during the War of the North and South, provided arms to Austria, and once bought up all the iron in England». He acquires a mansion on Grosvenor Square and tries to buy the Pickering Park estate in Sussex, becomes the chairman of the board of a large company promising investors fabulous profits, and runs for parliament. Around him swirl crowds of idle aristocrats, greedy upstarts, and cunning widows; the hands of his daughter attract the most desirable suitors of the empire — but how solid is the foundation of his success?.. The novel has been repeatedly adapted for television and radio; the most famous is the BBC miniseries of 2001 (which aired on Russian television under the title «The Roads We Choose») directed by David Yates (who later became famous for the four films about Harry Potter and all the films about «Fantastic Beasts»). The main role was played by David Suchet, world-renowned as Hercule Poirot in the series «Agatha Christie's Poirot» (1989–2013).