“Can You Forgive Her?” sees Anthony Trollope at his best and wisest as he maps the lives and loves of half-a-dozen characters, charting their yearnings, disappointments and, finally, triumphs. The story centers around Alice Vavasor and Lady Glencora, two women who search for better lives only to end up falling in love with the wrong men.Alice “had by degrees filled herself with a vague idea that there was a something to be done; a something over and beyond or perhaps altogether beside that marrying and having two children; -- if she only knew what it was.” Glencora marries for power and position, forsaking the rake she thinks she loves. Both women end up regretting their choice of partner. One of them ends up accepting her fate.A massive book with numerous subplots and minor characters, “Can You Forgive Her?” showcases Trollope’s ability to map scenes and choreograph his characters’ movements -- both their literal stage directions and figurative yearnings of the heart – with cinematic and psychological precision. (A crucial set-piece set during a ball that involves Glencora’s lover trying to steal her away while her husband watches is simply breathtaking in its suspense.)The first in Trollope’s celebrated Palliser series of novels, “Can You Forgive Her?” sets the tone and establishes the central themes that run through the entire sequence. Trollope here is mostly occupied with love and politics, and the intersection between the two. Unlike his loveable Barchester books, the Palliser novels have a darker undercurrent, with a real sense of menace and some well-earned cynicism.When one of the many men of power who appear in this book proclaims, “A desire for wealth is the source of all progress. Civilization comes from what men call greed,” it’s almost as if Trollope were writing for the 21st century.