“Some people like their oysters raw,” Nancy explains right off the bat, “and for them your job is easiest… But for those who took their oysters stewed, or fried – or baked, or scalloped, or put in a pie – my labours were more delicate.”

Tipping the Velvet is a Victorian euphemism for cunnilingus, just as oysters, presumably, are a metaphor for what the Victorians called a woman’s “sex”. Peter Curth in Salon calls it “an exuberant, lusty novel about a lesbian adventuress which follows its heroine through the underworld of Victorian London.”

Nan is obsessed by the music hall phenomenon Kitty Butler and visits all her shows. Soon after, she becomes her dresser and embark on a saucy and sensuous affair. This highly-acclaimed debut novel by Sarah Waters was chosen by The New York Times and The Library Journal as one of the best books of the year. It was adapted into a somewhat controversial three-part series of the same name, produced and broadcast by the BBC in 2002, and into a stage play in 2015.

Published in 1992.