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  Fairy Tales for Adults Volume 10

  Anton Chekhov, William Shakespeare

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  The theme of romance continues in this volume and begins with iconic 'The Lady with the Dog' by Anton Chekhov.Set in Yalta, Crimea, appears at first as a holiday romance. Gurov is a married man but he holidays on his own and has a history of holiday affairs. He meets the lady of the story’s title with her Pomeranian dog. But Chekhov’s love stories are not romantic accounts of unrequited love or of love at first sight. Or, even of tortured love that is amplified by the agony of being unfulfilled. No, these are Chekhovian tales that surprise and intrigue our imagination.In the second part of this volume we continues to a more familiar ground of Shakespearian love in his masterpiece 'King Lear'.

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  The Machine Stops

  E. M. Forster

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  The Machine Stops is a science fiction story. It describes a world in which almost all humans have lost the ability to live on the surface of the Earth. Each individual lives in isolation in a 'cell', with all bodily and spiritual needs met by the omnipotent, global Machine. Most humans welcome this development, as they are skeptical and fearful of first-hand experience. People forget that humans created the Machine, and treat it as a mystical entity whose needs supersede their own. Those who do not accept the deity of the Machine are viewed as 'unmechanical' and are threatened with "Homelessness". Eventually, the Machine apocalyptically collapses, and the civilization of the Machine comes to an end.

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  The Bride of Corinth

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) is widely recognized as Germany's greatest poet and writer. His early works are rooted in the German Sturm und Drang movement, which was also the early phase of German Romanticism.'The Bride of Corinth' was written as part of a ballad-writing competition which Goethe was engaged in with Friedrich von Schiller. It tells the grisly tale of star-crossed lovers who were betrothed as children. The bride's family has converted from the old magical gods to the newfangled Christianity and no longer wish their daughter to marry a pagan.When the bridegroom, having grown to manhood, arrives to claim his bride, he is welcomed by the mother, who shows him a room where he can sleep and recover from his journey. While he sleeps, his betrothed slips into his room and wakes him. While they consummate their marriage, the bridegroom makes a horrifying and macabre discovery....

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  Five Ghost Stories (Unabridged)

  M. R. James

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  M. R. James wrote, arguably, the finest supernatural tales in English literature, and this collection contains the best of them, including 'Canon Alberic's Scrapbook', 'Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come To You, My Lad', 'Lost Hearts', 'Casting the Runes', and 'Count Magnus'. James was something of an actor and gifted storyteller and read his tales aloud to select gatherings on many a Christmas Eve. His intention, he said, was to implant in his listener the idea that, 'if I am not careful, something of this kind might happen to me!' James (1862-1936) was an English medieval scholar and provost of King's College, Cambridge, and then Eton College. His ghost stories are beautifully crafted, ranging from the insidiously unsettling to the totally terrifying; his characters may catch the slightest movement out of the corner of their eye or hear, in the depths of the night, an indistinct rustling from a neighbouring bed. His professional interest in antiquarianism pervades many stories. He uses everyday contemporary settings like houses, omnibuses, hotels, golf courses, schools, and beaches, making the intrusion of the supernatural that much more unnerving. For Magpie Audio, narrator Greg Wagland relishes the opportunity to raise a goose bump or two.

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  The Secret Sharer

  Joseph Conrad

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  A young man sets out on his first voyage as captain, aboard a vessel and among a crew that are equally unfamiliar to him. A mysterious night-swimmer climbs aboard, and, in keeping the presence of this fugitive a secret, the skipper risks both his captaincy and the safety of his ship.A test of nerve in the Gulf of Siam ensues.

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  The Uttermost Farthing - Unabridged

  Richard Austin Freeman

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  The Uttermost Farthing is a mystery by R. Austin Freeman. 
  Excerpt from the book:Humphrey Challoner was a great savant spoiled by untimely wealth. When I knew him he had lapsed into a mere dilettante; at least, so I thought at the time, though subsequent revelations showed him in a rather different light. He had some reputation as a criminal anthropologist and had formerly been well known as a comparative anatomist, but when I made his acquaintance he seemed to be occupied chiefly in making endless additions to the specimens in his private museum. This collection I could never quite understand. It consisted chiefly of human and other mammalian skeletons, all of which presented certain small deviations from the normal; but its object I could never make out—until after his death; and then, indeed, the revelation was a truly astounding one.

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