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  The Cactus - From their pens to...

  O Henry

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  William Sydney Porter was born on 11th September 1862 in Greensboro, North Carolina. At age 3 his mother died from tuberculosis. From an early age it was clear Porter had a large appetite for reading as he absorbed the world around him. 
  He first attended at a school run by his aunt before enrolling at the Lindsey Street High School and then worked at his uncle’s drugstore and gained a pharmacists’ license in 1881.  
  A persistent cough took him to Texas in the hope that a change of climate would help his symptoms. He took on various types of work, initially from ranch hand and cook and then as varied as pharmacist, draftsman, bank teller and journalist. He also began to write, though for now, purely as a hobby. 
  He was a member of several singing and dramatic groups when he met 17 year old Athol Estes, daughter of a wealthy Austin family. Despite her mother’s objection owing to Athol’s tuberculosis, they began courting and in July 1887, they eloped and soon married. 
  Athol, impressed by his writing, encouraged him to get them published. A job as a draftsman at the Texas General Land Office paid a healthy $100 dollars per month and life was good. 
  But then life turned cruel. His son died a few hours after birth although a daughter, Margaret, came the following year.  His job had to be vacated but another was found at the First National Bank of Austin. The bank operated informally and Porter was careless in keeping the books. He lost that job but began writing for the humorous weekly The Rolling Stone and the Houston Post. Some time later the federal Bank auditors went through his former accounts and he was arrested on charges of embezzlement. 
  Porter fled the day before his trial to Honduras. Holed up for several months he began to write.  Athol had become too ill to travel to meet him and learning that her health was deteriorating he surrendered to the court in February 1897.  Bail was obtained so that he could stay with Athol during her final days.  
  Porter was sentenced to five years at the Ohio Penitentiary in Columbus. His pharmacy qualifications got him the job of night druggist.  His sentence also gave him time to write and publish fourteen short stories. In December 1899 in McClure’s Magazine he published a short story as O Henry.  
  He was released two years early in July 1901, and reunited with Margaret, now 11, in Pittsburgh.  He now began his most prolific period of writing; a short story per week for the New York World, while also publishing works in other magazines.  Eventually over 600 of his short stories were published. 
  Porter was a heavy drinker and in 1908 his health, which had deteriorated for several years, took a dramatic turn for the worse, as did his writing.  
  O Henry died of cirrhosis of the liver complicated by diabetes and an enlarged heart on 5th June 1910.

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  Unearthed - New Horror of...

  Dan Coxon, Tananarive Due, Josh...

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  Nineteen original horror stories exploring ancient sites, uncovering forgotten histories and prising open the tombs of the past, from award-winning authors and editors Dan Coxon and Philip Fracassi. 
   
  Unearthed digs beneath these crumbling structures to reveal their archaic pasts, and their darkest secrets. Featuring the best modern writers of horror and dark fantasy, these stories explore the caverns and the catacombs, the ruined temples and the monoliths – and drag an ancient evil back into the light.

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  The Generous Gambler - From...

  Charles Pierre Baudelaire

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  Charles Pierre Baudelaire was born on April 9th 1821 in Paris to an amateur artist mother and professional father.  His father died when Charles was 6 but his mother remarried shortly after to Lieutenant Colonel Jacques Aupick who later became a prominent ambassador.  Consequently Charles received a good education and was encouraged to enter the legal profession by both parents but instead wanted to pursue the life of the writer and had already developed an appetite, whilst studying law, for prostitutes and alcohol that inevitably led to debt and his parents disapproval. 
  Baudelaire's literary published work began with well received art reviews and essays.  He was a pioneering translator which included the works of Edgar Allan Poe but his most remarkable, famous and memorable works was his poetry and in particular his volume entitled The Flowers of Evil ('Les Fleurs du Mal').  The principal subject of these innovative styled poems about the changing nature of beauty in the modern industrialised Paris were sex and death and included lost innocence, lesbianism, alcohol, depression and urban corruption. This work created a huge controversy that led to the successful prosecution of both Baudelaire and his publisher for creating an offense against public morals. However, the book did find an appreciative audience including Victor Hugo who wrote to Baudelaire: 'Your fleurs du mal shine and dazzle like stars... I applaud your vigorous spirit with all my might'.  The poems were hugely influential and in 1949 the judgement was officially reversed and Baudelaire recognised for his incredible talent. 
  He died within a year of suffering a severe stroke on 31st August, 1867 and was buried in the Montparnasse Cemetery.

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  The Patriot - From their pens to...

  W L George

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  Walter Lionel George was born to British parents on the 20th March 1882 in Paris, France. 
  It was not until he was a young man of 20 that he learned English.  In 1905 he moved to London to work in an office but soon found himself working as a journalist, and as a foreign correspondent, for various London newspapers. 
  By 1911, with the publication of his first novel ‘A Bed of Roses’, which portrayed the fall of a penniless young woman into prostitution, his efforts were rewarded, and he turned to literature as a full-time career. 
  His writings now sold well.  He added short stories to his offerings as well as literary essays and several tracts that discussed left-wing themes.  Some critics thought his subject matter to be difficult and poorly chosen. His political views gained him little credit amongst his peers although such luminaries as George Orwell praised both subject matter and style. 
  His personal life was also turbulent.  His three marriages left him widowed twice.  In 1908 he married Helen Porter who died in 1914.  Helen Agnes Moorhead followed in 1916 but died only 4 years later.  His last marriage was to Kathleen Geipel in 1921. 
  W. L George died on 30th January 1926.  He was 43.

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  Dark to Light and Other Stories

  Stephen Filbey

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  Life thwarts Floyd’s goals sooner or later. A rival challenges his new invention. His buried gold is confiscated by HM Treasury. He is wrongly charged with arson. He is unfairly dismissed. He campaigns to change part of English punctuation, yet inadvertently continues to use it afterwards. Helping a friend lands him in hospital. What has he done to deserve all this?Yet he is resourceful in dealing with his adverse situations, whether personal or confronting the might of the state. Other characters must eat humble pie to stay afloat. College lecturer Ed Beck forsakes his principles. And Matt abandons his business dreams to preserve an old friendship.

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  The Favored Son - A Cultivation...

  Tao Wong

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  Winter is a time of reflection and cultivation for the Verdant Green Waters Sect. For Wu Ying, this peaceful interlude is interrupted by a new assignment that pits him against the mortal world’s conventions of class and privilege.  
  A short story in the world of A Thousand Li by Tao Wong.

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