The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber

I loved this book! It's a great, big, sprawling tale set in 19th-century London about an ambitious prostitute named Sugar, her self-absorbed nouveau riche benefactor, and his troubled family. The Crimson Petal and the White is wonderfully descriptive and completely entertaining -- like a cross between a Dickens novel and the movie Moulin Rouge. Now that's my kind of book!