Publisher: Project Gutenberg
"The Adventure of Wisteria Lodge" is one of the fifty-six Sherlock Holmes short stories written by British author Arthur Conan Doyle.
This is a short poetic story based on characters from the Magicians series. I am beyond life, I am beyond strife, I am long beyond my last breath, I'm among the angelic host, some call me a ghost, I awoke one day dead or as good as dead, I knew not how it was even possible me being a ghost as I was the king of the grim reapers, so I cannot die in a normal way as this to become a ghost.Show book
A dynamic collection of stories that portrays different generations and explores various genres with compassion and dry witIn The Melting Pot, nothing is ever what it seems. In these short stories from critically acclaimed author Lynne Sharon Schwartz, characters grapple with the desires and needs of daily life, no matter how absurd or mundane. In the title story, a woman finally reveals her tangled family history to her widowed lover. In another tale, an ageing womanizer undergoes more than just a midlife crisis. In “So You’re Going to Have a New Body!” a woman experiences a surreal surgical sterilization. The Melting Pot demonstrates Schwartz’s many talents coalescing into a determined and striking whole.Show book
Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant was born on August 5th, 1850 near Dieppe in France. Maupassant’s early life was badly torn when at age 11 (his younger brother Hervé was then five) his mother, Laure, a headstrong and independent-minded woman, risked social disgrace in order to obtain a legal separation from her husband. After the separation, Laure kept custody of her two boys. With the father now forcibly absent, Laure became the most influential and important figure in the young boy's life. Maupassant’s education was such that he rebelled against religion and other societal norms but a developing friendship with Gustave Flaubert began to turn his mind towards creativity and writing. After graduation he volunteered for the Franco-Prussian war. With its end he moved to Paris to work as a clerk in the Navy Department. Gustave Flaubert now took him under his wing. Acting as a literary guardian to him, he guided the eager Maupassant to debuts in journalism and literature. For Maupassant these were exciting times and the awakening of his creative talents and ambitions. In 1880 he published what is considered his first great work, ‘Boule de Suif’, (translated as as ‘Dumpling’, ‘Butterball’, ‘Ball of Fat’, or ‘Ball of Lard’) which met with a success that was both instant and overwhelming. Flaubert at once acknowledged that it was ‘a masterpiece that will endure.’ Maupassant had used his talents and experiences in the war to create something unique. This decade from 1880 to 1891 was to be the most pivotal of his career. With an audience now made available by the success of ‘Boule de Suif’ Maupassant organised himself to work methodically and relentlessly to produce between two and four volumes of work a year. The melding of his talents and business sense and the continual hunger of sources for his works made him wealthy. In his later years he developed a desire for solitude, an obsession for self-preservation, and a fear of death as well as a paranoia of persecution caused by the syphilis he had contracted in his youth. On January 2nd, 1892, Maupassant tried to commit suicide by cutting his throat. Unsuccessful he was committed to the private asylum of Esprit Blanche at Passy, in Paris. It was here on July 6th, 1893 that Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant died at the age of only 42. This volume comes to you from Portable Poetry, a specialized imprint from Deadtree Publishing. Our range is large and growing and covers single poets, themes, and many compilations.Show book
In the eastern reaches of the Thames lies the Hispaniola, an inn kept by Jim Hawkins and his son. Late one night, a mysterious girl named Natty arrives on the river with a request for Jim from her father - Long John Silver. Aged and weak, but still possessing a strange power, the pirate proposes Jim and Natty sail to Treasure Island in search of Captain Flint's hidden bounty. But the thrill of the ocean odyssey gives way to terror as the Nightingale reaches its destination, for it seems Treasure Island is not as uninhabited as it once was... Silver is a worthy sequel to Treasure Island and a work of extraordinary authenticity and imaginative power from one of England's greatest writers.Show book
This “sterling debut” short story collection explores immigrant life in prose that is “crisp and economical but also poetic and full of imagery” (Publishers Weekly, starred review). The nine linked stories of Reema Rajbanshi’s Sugar, Smoke, Song are set in the Bronx, California, India, and Brazil. Following the secrets and passions of young women, these stories and their narrators cross genres and rules to arrive at unforeseen lives. A subway rider remembers enacting the gods with her estranged twin; a concert usher discovers her tango-dancing boyfriend’s lover; and a literacy worker confesses the gambles she and others have lost through the bluesy singers she admires. Told through semi-experimental play with nonlinear plots, plural narrators, and hybrid prose, these stories embody the experiences of immigrants from Africa, Asia and South America who carrying histories both unseen and cyclically lived.Show book
Joseph Conrad – An Introduction. Born in 1857 in Poland, Joseph Conrad became a British citizen just before he turned 30. In the intervening years he lost both parents; becoming an orphan at 11 being thereafter raised by an uncle, who at 16 let the boy go to Marseille where he began to work on merchant ships though at times it included stints gun running and the intrigue of political conspiracy. At age 36 his life turned from one of ships to one of literary pursuit. Conrad brought to English Literature both a further layer of style and a deeper examination of the human psyche in a wealth of work. He wrote many novels, rightly regarded today, as some of the finest in English literature. Among their canon are Lord Jim, Nostromo, The Shadow Line and of course Heart Of Darkness. For this volume we dwell among his numerous short stories and the heart of Joseph Conrad. These stories are read for you by Richard Mitchley.Show book
