(Hawthorne, #3) Three years after being abandoned by Maria Ashton, the vicar's daughter with whom he had fallen in love, Trey Hawthorne, the future duke of Salterdon, discovers that his beloved had been confined in an insane asylum by his scheming and manipulative grandmother.
Severity reflects intensity, not value — “central theme” means a warning is a core part of the book, not that the book is bad.