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  Dies Irae - From their pens to...

  Kenneth Grahame

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  Kenneth Grahame was born on 8th March 1859 in Edinburgh. 
  At age 5 his mother succumbed to puerperal fever.  His father, who had a drinking problem, now sent his 4 children to live with their grandmother at her large house in Cookham, Berkshire. Here the children lived in large open grounds next to the river.  These early experiences would in later years, be retold in his writing through a myriad of characters. 
  Grahame loved being a pupil at St Edward's School, Oxford and wanted to enroll at the university there but his guardian demurred on account of the cost. 
  Instead, a banking career was chosen for him, starting in 1879 at the Bank of England, where he rose steadily to the rank of its Secretary until retiring, with a pension, in 1908 due to ill health. 
  Alongside his commercial career Grahame had written and published various stories and essays in several periodicals. Some were anthologized as ‘Pagan Papers’ in 1893, and two years later ‘The Golden Age’ and later still ‘Dream Days’ and its masterpiece ‘The Reluctant Dragon’ became part of many home libraries.  His ability to view life through the lens of a young and curious child was superb, enabling the reader to easily identify with the character.   
  Grahame married Elspeth Thomson in 1899 and they had one child; Alastair, born semi-blind and plagued by health problems.  In a heart-rending tragedy he would later take his own life whilst attending Oxford University in 1920.   
  In 1908 Grahame reworked many of the bedtime stories he had fashioned for his son into the enduring favourite; ‘The Wind in the Willows’, describing the heart-warming adventures of Mr Toad and his friends.   
  Kenneth Grahame died in Pangbourne, Berkshire, on 6th July 1932.

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  Top 10 Short Stories The - Barry...

  Barry Pain

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  Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart.  A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere. 
   
  In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens’ across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author?  
   
  The theme itself will form the boundaries for our stories which range from well-known classics, newly told, to stories that modern times have overlooked but perfectly exemplify the theme.  Throughout the volume our authors whether of instant recognition or new to you are all leviathans of literature. 
   
  Some you may disagree with but they will get you thinking; about our choices and about those you would have made.  If this volume takes you on a path to discover more of these miniature masterpieces then we have all gained something. 
   
  Most people will shrug at the name of ‘Barry Pain’, if you are one of them you are in for a treat.  Pain was a brilliant storyteller who took on difficult issues and situations and handled each with aplomb and a knowing way that only true talent can. 
   
  01 - The Top 10 - Barry Pain - An Introduction 
  02 - The Diary of a God by Barry Pain 
  03 - The Act of Heroism by Barry Pain 
  04 - The Case of Vincent Pyrwhit by Barry Pain 
  05 - The Green Light by Barry Pain 
  06 - The Magnet by Barry Pain 
  07 - The End of a Show by Barry Pain 
  08 - A Complete Recovery by Barry Pain 
  09 - The Extermination by Barry Pain 
  10 - Murder, from The Memoirs of Constantine Dix by Barry Pain 
  11 - Post Mortem by Barry Pain

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  New Machiavelli The - Book the...

  H. G. Wells

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  Herbert George "H. G." Wells (1866 - 1946) was an English writer.
  He was prolific in many genres, including the novel, history, politics, social commentary, and textbooks and rules for war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is called a "father of science fiction"
  BOOK THE FOURTH: ISABEL: I come to the most evasive and difficult part of my story, which is to tell how Isabel and I have made a common wreck of our joint lives. It is not the telling of one simple disastrous accident.

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  King Solomon's Mines

  H. Rider Haggard

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  Written in 1885, “King Solomon’s Mines” by Henry Rider Haggard is at first glance, very much a book of its time. Its narrator, Alan Quartermain, is the archetype Colonial white hunter and adventurer.  
  He thinks nothing of bagging an elephant or two for its tusks or a giraffe for its meat, and his attitude towards the natives of South Africa is undoubtedly paternal at best. However, by the end of his exciting tale there is no doubting his admiration and affection for the brave warriors whom he finds himself fighting alongside.  
  And an exciting story it is!  Upon reading it we soon realise how it has influenced the Epic Adventure story ever since, from Kipling and Conan Doyle to “The Lord of the Rings” and “Indiana Jones”.

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  Top 10 Short Stories The -...

  Rudyard Kipling

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  Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart.  A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere. 
   
  In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens’ across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author?  
   
  The theme itself will form the boundaries for our stories which range from well-known classics, newly told, to stories that modern times have overlooked but perfectly exemplify the theme.  Throughout the volume our authors whether of instant recognition or new to you are all leviathans of literature. 
   
  Some you may disagree with but they will get you thinking; about our choices and about those you would have made.  If this volume takes you on a path to discover more of these miniature masterpieces then we have all gained something. 
   
  Kipling in these more modern times is increasingly seen as an apologist for the bad ways of evil empires.  It’s a simplistic analysis and avoids much of his literary talent that is entertaining, scary and down right brilliant story telling whatever the background it is based on or comes from.   
   
  01 - Top 10 - Rudyard Kipling - An Introduction 
  02 - The Man Who Would Be King - Part 1 
  03 - The Man Who Would Be King - Part 2 
  04 - They 
  05 - The Phantom Rickshaw 
  06 - My Own True Ghost Story 
  07 - Mark of the Beast 
  08 - Baa Baa Black Sheep 
  09 - The Maltese Cat 
  10 - Mary Postgate 
  11 - The Gardener 
  12 -At the End of the Passage

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  Across the Sullen Void - A...

  Ray Bradbury

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  This is a collection of science fiction short stories that were written for the pulp sci-fi magazines of the 1940s - 1950s. It includes new illustrations and minor edits to the original text. The selections were chosen to showcase Ray Bradbury's flavor of science-fiction/fantasy that he became famous for. This includes stories about technological advancement, space exploration, alien invasion, space warfare, encounters with hostile aliens, and trips to alien planets (including Mars). While the stories were written about a future that we have yet to achieve, the human struggles that these stories explore as still as relevant today, as the day they were written.

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