Publisher's Synopsis
The year is 1775, and social ills plague both France and England. Jerry Cruncher,
an odd-job man who works for Tellson's Bank, stop the Dover mail-coach with an urgent message for Jarvis Lorry.
The message instructs Lorry to wait at Dover for a young woman, and Lorry responds with the cryptic words, "Recalled to Life." At Dover, Lorry is met by Lucie Manette, a young orphan whose father, a once-eminent doctor whom
she supposed dead, has been discovered in France.
Lorry escorts Lucie to Paris, where they meet Defarge, a former servant of Doctor Manette, who has kept Manette safe in a garret. Driven mad by eighteen years
in the Bastille, Manette spends all of his time making shoes, a hobby he learned while in prison. Lorry assures Lucie that her love and devotion can recall
her father to life, and indeed they do.