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  Christmas Eve

  Nikolái Gógol

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  "Christmas Eve"  is the first story in the second volume of the collection Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka by Nikolai Gogol.
  The story opens with a description of the winter scenery of Dikanka, Ukraine, a witch flying across the night sky and the devil stealing the moon and hiding it in his pocket, first playing with it in the sky, which no one in the village notices. Since it is the night before Christmas, the devil is free to roam around and torment people as he pleases, so he decides to find a way to get back at the village blacksmith, Vakula, because he paints religious art in the church...
  The story is set in on Christmas Eve in the small Ukranian town of Dikanka. Since it's the night before Christmas, the devil is allowed to roam free in town. He steals the moon, which at first no one notices. Then he sets out to ruin the love interest of Vakula, the town blacksmith, who is hopelessly in love with the beautiful Oksana. The devil has a vendetta against Vakula because he also moonlights as an icon painter who had created mocking pictures of the devil. The devil finds an ally in Vakula's mother (a witch) who wants to marry Oksana's father. She fears that if her son marries Oksana, her love chances will be ruined.

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  Around the World in Eighty Days...

  Jules Verne

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  Phileas Fogg wagers half his fortune that he can circle the earth in eighty days, and leaves the Reform Club within the hour with a French servant and no luggage. Verne worked from the railway and steamship timetables that had just made such a journey possible, and the novel reads like a schedule under attack — elephants, a rescued widow, a detective with the wrong warrant. The trick it ends on is arithmetic, and readers who see it coming love the book no less. Its 91 original illustrations have been carefully restored and coloured for this edition.

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  Tales of Terror and Mystery -...

  Arthur Conan Doyle

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  The horror Doyle wrote when Holmes was not looking: a surgeon's night call, a special train that vanishes between two stations, an aeroplane too high for safety, and the pit under the earth. He wanted to be remembered for history and spiritualism, and produced instead some of the coldest short terror in English — the Brazilian Cat and the Leather Funnel do not need a detective. Fifty-one plates by Goya and Fuseli, from cudgel duels to a radiant figure beset by dark spirits, give these tales the nightmares they deserve.

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  From the Earth to the Moon

  Jules Verne

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  Before humanity reached the Moon, Jules Verne imagined what it might take to get there.
  
  In From the Earth to the Moon, Jules Verne presents one of the pioneering works of science fiction and one of literature's most imaginative visions of lunar exploration. When the ambitious members of the Baltimore Gun Club decide to launch a projectile toward the Moon, their extraordinary plan sets an unforgettable adventure into motion.
  
  Led by the determined Impey Barbicane, the group begins tackling the enormous scientific and engineering challenges involved in their lunar project. Their plans attract worldwide attention and bring together remarkable personalities, ambitious inventors, and unexpected complications.
  
  Blending science fiction, adventure, humor, engineering, and scientific speculation, Verne transforms a seemingly impossible idea into an entertaining and surprisingly detailed vision of space travel. His fascination with technology and scientific progress gives the story its distinctive sense of wonder.
  
  The novel explores enduring themes of human curiosity, technological innovation, exploration, ambition, scientific discovery, and the desire to push beyond known boundaries. Verne's imaginative approach makes the Moon feel both distant and tantalizingly within reach.
  
  First published in the nineteenth century, From the Earth to the Moon became one of Jules Verne's most influential works and helped establish the imaginative tradition of space adventure that continues to inspire readers and creators today.
  
  Join the daring expedition that attempts to reach the Moon from Earth. Download From the Earth to the Moon today and experience Jules Verne's visionary classic of science, adventure, innovation, and exploration.

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  Gobseck

  Honoré de Balzac

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  In Gobseck, Honoré de Balzac delivers a powerful and penetrating exploration of wealth, obsession, and the hidden machinery of society. Set in post-Napoleonic Paris, this masterful novella—part of Balzac's monumental collection La Comédie Humaine—examines the corrosive power of money and the moral compromises people make in pursuit of status and survival.
  
  At the center of the story stands Jean-Esther van Gobseck, an aging and enigmatic moneylender whose life revolves around one unwavering principle: gold rules the world. Cold, calculating, and emotionally detached, Gobseck has built his fortune by lending money to desperate aristocrats and ambitious social climbers, watching with clinical fascination as debt exposes their secrets, weaknesses, and hypocrisies. To him, human emotions—love, honor, loyalty—are mere illusions, all ultimately subject to the authority of money.
  
  The narrative unfolds through the perspective of a young lawyer, Derville, who recounts Gobseck's life and his dealings with the aristocratic Countess de Restaud. As the Countess spirals into financial and moral ruin to sustain her extravagant lifestyle and illicit passions, Gobseck becomes both witness and silent judge. Through this tragic entanglement, Balzac reveals the fragile façade of high society and the devastating consequences of greed, vanity, and unchecked desire.
  
  Yet Gobseck is more than a portrait of a miser. It is a profound meditation on capitalism, power, and human nature. Gobseck himself is a paradox—both predator and philosopher, villain and observer. Though he accumulates immense wealth, he lives in stark austerity, hoarding treasures he never uses, revealing the emptiness at the heart of his obsession. His life poses unsettling questions: Is wealth power, security, or prison? Can a person truly possess riches without being possessed by them?
  
  Balzac's sharp realism, vivid characterizations, and incisive social commentary make Gobseck a timeless study of ambition and morality. With psychological depth and keen insight into the financial and emotional transactions that govern human relationships, this novella remains strikingly relevant in a world still driven by profit and power.
  
  Dark, intelligent, and unflinchingly honest, Gobseck is a compelling exploration of the price of wealth—and the cost of losing one's soul in its pursuit.

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  Twelfth Night

  SHAKESPEARE Shakespeare

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  Twelfth Night is a story written by Shakespeare. It's a romantic comedy in which the Duke is in love with Olivia. Olivia is in love with Cesario (but this is Viola dressed as a boy). Viola is in love with the Duke and Viola's twin brother appears. The moral of the story is: true love will prevail. Recommended for age 9+.

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