Other books that might interest you

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  David Copperfield

  Charles Dickens

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  The story deals with the life of David Copperfield from childhood to maturity. David's father had died six months before he was born, and seven years later, his mother remarries but David and his step-father don’t get on and he is sent to boarding school. As David settles into life we are taken along with him and meet a dazzling array of characters, some of whom we will never forget and some of whom we won't want to remember!

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  Dagon

  H.P. Lovecraft

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  Before throwing himself from the window of his attic, the untitled protagonist writes some notes related to his mental state. Then, he begins to recall an old story that happened in the years of the First World War: suddenly, he finds himself a prisoner of a German ship in the Pacific Ocean. After only five days, the protagonist manages to escape with a raft. Wandering for days, adrift in the sea, one afternoon he finds himself stranded on a disquieting and apparently deserted island and, from there, things only get stranger... 
    
   "Dagon" is the second story of the writer H.P.Lovecraft, written in 1917 and published, for the first time, in 1919. 

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  Running Wolf - Set in the...

  Algernon Blackwood

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  Algernon Blackwood was born on 14th March 1869 in Shooter’s Hill, South East London, to a religious middle-class family. His mother was a widowed Duchess and his father was a Post Office administrator.  
   
  Blackwood was interested in the paranormal and the supernatural at an early age, and had a thirst for anything on Buddhism, other Oriental philosophies, mysticism and occultism.  In his writings the weaving of the supernatural into his various works, from ghost stories and children’s stories to plays and long novels is clearly seen, his writings beautifully enriched by his long and diversified life experience.  
   
  After leaving university and visiting parts of Europe, mainly Switzerland, the young writer went to Canada and the United States where he took on jobs including work as a farmer, a bartender, a secretary, a journalist, a reporter, running a hotel and teaching the violin.  He was voracious in meeting new people and absorbing new ideas.  
   
  In his late thirties, he returned to England where he published two of his supernatural stories in Pall Mall Magazine. As more of his highly entertaining stories were published so did his reputation and his bank balance.  All those years of curiosity and experiences were starting to emerge from his writing. 
   
  In 1906, ‘The Empty House & Other Ghost Stories’ was published with tremendous success.  Further volumes of short stories followed and with it a larger audience and bigger paydays. He also published children’s stories. 
   
  Blackwood also had ideas for novels and to explore on a larger canvas the paranormal world and the relationship between man and metaphysical powers including, in 1911, ‘The Centaur’.  
   
  With the outbreak of the First World War, Blackwood was assigned to British intelligence to write propaganda to support the war effort. 
   
  He was a prolific author with a quite staggering output which was also to include many plays. The exact number of his works is unknown as he would frequently write a story for a newspaper or periodical at very short notice.  
   
  In 1949, Blackwood was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in recognition of his literary talents and his services during the First World War.  
   
  Algernon Blackwood died on 10th December 1951 after a series of strokes.  
   
  The mysteries of the natural world are enhanced by those of the Native American spirit world in this wonderfully descriptive short story of a man’s fishing expedition to Medicine Lake.

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  Mother Goose in Prose

  L. Frank Baum

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  "Mother Goose in Prose" is a collection of twenty-two children's stories based on Mother Goose nursery rhymes. It was the first children's book written by L. Frank Baum. It was originally published in 1897 by Way and Williams of Chicago, and re-released by the George M. Hill Company in 1901.

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  Ladies

  Anton Chekhov

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  "Ladies" by Anton Chekhov tells the story of Fyodor Petrovitch, the Director of Elementary Schools in the N. District, who offers a vacant post to a schoolmaster, Vremensky, who lost his voice. However, when Fyodor Petrovitch's wife, Nastasya Ivanovna, asks him to consider Polzuhin, a young man she knows, for the same post, Fyodor Petrovitch refuses, stating that he does not give posts through patronage. Despite his refusal, he begins receiving letters recommending Polzuhin for the position, and Polzuhin himself appears before Fyodor Petrovitch. In the end, Fyodor Petrovitch, tired of the pressure, gives the post to Polzuhin, leaving Vremensky in a dire situation. The story is a satire on the corrupt nature of patronage and nepotism in society. Read in English, unabridged.

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  John Davys Beresford - A Short...

  John Davys Beresford

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  John Davys Beresford was born on 17th March 1873.  His life was blighted by infantile paralysis which left him partially disabled. 
   
  After an education at Oundle school he trained to be an architect.  However, he quickly decided that his life was to be centred on a literary career.  His first offerings were in drama and as a journalist. 
   
  As well as being a book reviewer for the Manchester Guardian he contributed to New Statesman, The Spectator, Westminster Gazette, and the Theosophist magazine The Aryan Path.   
   
  His spiritual journey in early adulthood had claimed him as an agnostic, in defiance of his clergyman father.  This view he later abandoned in preference to describing himself as a Theosophist and a pacifist. 
   
  As well as many novels, many themed with spiritual and philosophical elements.  Beresford was also a gifted short story writer particularly across the science-fiction, horror and ghost genres. 
   
  All of these elements helped him to obtain a prominent place in Edwardian Literary London. 
   
  John Davys Beresford died on the 2nd February 1947. He was 73. 
   
  1 - John Davys Beresford - A Short Story Collection - An Introduction 
  2 - The Introvert by John Davys Beresford 
  3 - The Miracle by John Davys Beresford 
  4 - Enlargement by John Davys Beresford 
  5 - As the Crow Flies by John Davys Beresford 
  6 - The Barrage by John Davys Beresford 
  7 - Signs & Wonders by John Davys Beresford 
  8 - The Looking Glass by John Davys Beresford 
  9 - The Cage by John Davys Beresford

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