At the time of her death in 1992, Angela Carter had become one of the most important and widely read British writers. In the first book-length study devoted to her novels, Linden Peach demonstrates how Carter's fiction has retained the power to shock us, move us and make us laugh. This lively book provides both close readings of individual texts and an overview of her work. Although Carter preferreda mode of writing closer to fantasy than the English realist novel and frequently drew on prenovelistic forms, Linden Peach maintains that she still addressed the 'actuality' of people's lives. In novels crammed with themes, ideas and images, Carter is seen as blurring the boundaries between literature, philosophy and cultural critique.