A subplot concerns the stepdaughter of a Dissenting minister who is the true heir to the Transome estate, but who is unaware of the fact.

As the story starts, the reader is introduced to the fictitious community of Treby in the English Midlands in 1832, around the time of the First Reform Act.

Harold Transome, a local landowner, has returned home after a fifteen-year trading career in the Middle East.

Harold Transome gains the support of his Tory uncle, the Rector of Little Treby, and enlists the help of his family lawyer, Matthew Jermyn, as an electioneering agent.

In this village resides Felix Holt, who has recently returned from extensive travels in Glasgow to live with his mother.

Lyon learns from Maurice Christian, servant of Philip Debarry, about the possible identity of Esther's biological father.

Her relationship with her stepfather deepens, while she also desires to emulate the high moral standards impressed upon her by Felix Holt.

Matthew Jermyn is eventually ruined and moves abroad, while John Johnson remains and prospers as a lawyer.

After the lack of success with Romola, George Eliot returned to the more familiar English provincial setting for Felix Holt, the Radical, and resumed her publishing relationship with Blackwood's Magazine.

Both George Henry Lewes and John Blackwood were reportedly excited at the prospect of a novel pertinent to current affairs.

However, upon the story's release, some criticism was drawn to its less-than-substantial focus on politics, although this itself can be argued as representing an underlying theme in the book.

[3] Overall, Felix Holt, the Radical was an average success, but it remains one of George Eliot's least read novels.

"[1] In January 1868, Eliot penned an article entitled "Address to Working Men, by Felix Holt".

This came on the heels of the Reform Act 1867 which expanded the right to vote beyond the landed classes and was written in the character of, and signed by, Felix Holt.