Personal Statement
I teach on a variety of modules across the English Department, from modules on first-year literary theory and second-year nineteenth-century literature, to third-year Gothic and literature and feminisms. I also contribute to the Victorian pathway of the MA and convene the module Victorian Murder and Other Crimes.

My particular interests are in literature and psychology, crime fiction (especially representations of criminal psychology and psychopathy), horror, film and television adaptation, and Victorian realist prose.

I would welcome PhD students who are interested in Victorian realism, Victorian or contemporary crime fiction, Victorian or contemporary Gothic/horror fiction or film, or literature in adaptation.

My academic support and feedback hours for the autumn 2025 term are Tuesdays, 2-3pm, and Wednesdays, 12-1pm, in my office (room 2.47 of 19 Abercromby Square) or through Microsoft Teams (email during that time for a Teams call back). If you need to see me and can't make the times, please just email me at m.a.raines@liverpool.ac.uk--I'd be happy to arrange a meeting at another time.

Research Overview
My research roots are Victorian, and I've published on George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, and Anthony Trollope. I'm particularly interested in the variety of Victorian realism, the relationship between narrative and psychological realism, and literary manuscripts. I'm also interested in crime fiction (Victorian and contemporary), horror fiction (contemporary), film and television adaptation, and the teaching of genre fiction and film.

In recent years I've published on representations of psychopathy in the Bryan Fuller adaptation of Thomas Harris's Hannibal Lecter novels, on Wilkie Collins's language in Cambridge University Press's Wilkie Collins in Context, and on representations of disability in Stephen King's Pet Sematary for Theorizing Stephen King with Amsterdam University Press. I also co-edited a special issue of the journal Humanities on Victorian Realism and Crime.

I'm currently writing about crime, clothing, and identity in Margaret Atwood's Alias Grace, as well as Victorian influences in the 2008 horror film Lake Mungo.