Who
exactly was Jacob Marley? How did his
life impact that of Ebenezer Scrooge? The
two young men meet at Professor Drabb’s Academy for Boys where Jacob starts
their friendship by conning young Ebenezer.
They later start a business together with Jacob Marley as the figurehead
who works with people to put together the business plan and Ebenezer Scrooge as
the man who is great with the numbers.
While Marley seems to drift into a world of sin and hedonism, Ebenezer
joins his church’s choir and finds love with his sister fan’s friend, Belle. As he tries to accumulate the wealth needed
to marry her, will he be able to cut himself free of Marley’s web of deceit?
I
thought Marley was an interesting Victorian novel. It gave background to one of my favorite
Dickens stories, A Christmas Carol.
Marley is a figure in that story, but so much is unknown. This novel fleshed out a lot of the detail. Although it is called Marley, it is really
the story of both men as it either centers on Scrooge or Marley. I thought it was interesting that is has their
fortune being made through the slave trade.
Scrooge wants to get out of it, but Marley uses his double crossing to cheat
Scrooge and continue to make money off of it.
Marley was truly a despicable character, even his true love for Fan was
tainted. It made me sad for Scrooge
that he wanted to have a good life, and he got caught up in Marley’s tainted
life and web. I thought it was also
interesting that Scrooge was written such that he might be autistic with his
great head for numbers, but inability to connect with people. I also loved that the author referenced other
Dicken’s tales by having characters and many of Marley’s aliases use names from
other books like Steerforth and Macawber from David Copperfield.
Matthew
Lloyd Davies was a great narrator. I
liked his accent and his narration style.
There was a small cast of characters in this book with it mostly
centering on Scrooge, Marley, Scrooge’s sister Fan, Fan’s friend Belle, and Mother
Scrooge. I felt like I got to really
know them as the novel went forward, although Marley still remained mysterious
to me. Where was his family and what was
his background before he came to the school?
What started him on his path of deceit?
Overall,
Marley was an interesting look into the dark Victorian history that formed the
miserly Scrooge’s character. I came out
caring more for Scrooge and resenting Marley more.
