Publisher: Jules verne
The English at the North Pole was originally published in 1864, being begun even before Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth. This vigorous Arctic tale was used to found and introduce a "Magazine of Adventure,"which was continued for some years. The book contains an accurate picture of Arctic life and of the Arctic geography known to the world of 1864.
A framing story is told in the first person by Darrell Standing, a university professor serving life imprisonment in San Quentin State Prison for murder. Prison officials try to break his spirit by means of a torture device called "the jacket," a canvas jacket which can be tightly laced so as to compress the whole body, inducing angina. Standing discovers how to withstand the torture by entering a kind of trance state, in which he walks among the stars and experiences portions of past lives.Show book
The debut of Ireland’s greatest author and one of the most influential voices in modern literature It took nine years for James Joyce to find a publisher for this vivid, uncompromising, and altogether brilliant portrait of Dublin at the turn of the twentieth century. Now regarded as one of the finest story collections in the English language, it contains such masterpieces as “Araby,” “Grace,” and “The Dead,” and serves as a valuable and accessible introduction to the themes that define Joyce’s later work, including the monumental Ulysses. Elegantly interweaving a moral history of Ireland with profiles of brave, flawed, and utterly realistic individuals—many of them clearly drawn from the author’s own life—experiencing moments of profound insight, Dubliners is an essential work of art. This ebook has been professionally proofread to ensure accuracy and readability on all devices.Show book
Sons and Lovers is a famous novel by D. H. Lawrence. The refined daughter of a "good old burgher family," Gertrude Coppard meets a rough-hewn miner, Walter Morel, at a Christmas dance and falls into a whirlwind romance characterized by physical passion. But soon after her marriage to Walter, she realizes the difficulties of living off his meagre salary in a rented house. The couple fight and drift apart and Walter retreats to the pub after work each day. Gradually, Mrs. Morel's affections shift to her sons beginning with the oldest, William. As a boy, William is so attached to his mother that he doesn't enjoy the fair without her. As he grows older, he defends her against his father's occasional violence. Later he leaves for a job in London, and rises up into the middle class. He gets engaged, but dies. Mrs. Morel is heartbroken, but when Paul catches pneumonia she rediscovers her love for her second son…Show book
Mary Frances Butts was born on 13th December 1890 in Poole, Dorset. Her early years were spent at Salterns, an 18th-century house overlooking Poole Harbour. Sadly in 1905 her father died, and she was sent for boarding at St Leonard's school for girls in St Andrews. Her mother remarried and, from 1909, Mary studied at Westfield College in London, and here, first became aware of her bisexual feelings. She was sent down for organising a trip to Epsom races and only completed her degree in 1914 when she graduated from the London School of Economics. By then Mary had become an admirer of the occultist Aleister Crowley and she was given a co-authorship credit on his ‘Magick (Book 4)’. In 1916, she began the diary which would now detail her future life and be a constant reference point for her observations and her absorbing experiences. During World War I, she was doing social work for the London County Council in Hackney Wick, and involved in a lesbian relationship. Life changed after meeting the modernist poet, John Rodker and they married in 1918. In 1921 she spent 3 months at Aleister Crowley's Abbey of Thelema in Sicily; she found the practices dreadful and also acquired a drug habit. Mary now spent time writing in Dorset, including her celebrated book of short stories ‘Speed the Plough’ which saw fully develop her unique Modernist prose style. Europe now beckoned and several years were spent in Paris befriending many artists and writing further extraordinary stories. She was continually sought after by literary magazines and also published several short story collections as books. Although a Modernist writer she worked in other genres but is essentially only known for her short stories. Mary was deeply committed to nature conservation and wrote several pamphlets attacking the growing pollution of the countryside. In 1927, she divorced and the following year her novel ‘Armed with Madness’ was published. A further marriage followed in 1930 and time was spent attempting to settle in London and Newcastle before setting up home on the western tip of Cornwall. By 1934 the marriage had failed. Mary Butts died on 5th March 1937, at the West Cornwall Hospital, Penzance, after an operation for a perforated gastric ulcer. She was 46. Her story ‘In Bayswater’ grippingly describes a man’s friendship with a dysfunctional family he rents a room from. As each facet reveals itself his opinion and decisions change, back and forth, this way and that….Show book
Melville Davisson Post (1869-1930) was an American author best known for his detective stories.The Problem of the Five Marks tells the tale of a young American who arrives in Paris with secret instructions from his father for the head of the Paris Police. All he knows is that it pertains to the recent death of his Great Aunt.The senior detective whisks him off to Belgium, where he meets a mysterious and beautiful young woman with a dog-cart and her paralysed father, who are not the poor peasants they appear to be. Before he knows it, he is on the trail of the mysterious 'Five Marks' which will lead to a fabulous treasure.Show book
For sheer storytelling delight and pure adventure, Treasure Island has never been surpassed. From the moment young Jim Hawkins first encounters the sinister Blind Pew at the Admiral Benbow Inn until the climactic battle for treasure on a tropic isle, the nevel creates scenes and characters that have firetd the imaginations of generations of readers. Written by a superb prose stylist, a master of both action and atmosphere, the story centers upon the conflict between good and evil - but in this case a particularly engaging form of evil. It is the villainy of that most ambiguous rogue Long John Silver that sets the tempo of this tale of treachery, greed, and daring.Designed to forever kindle a dream of high romance and distant horizons, Treasure Island is, in the words of G. K. Chesterton, "the realization of an ideal, that which is promised in its provocative and beckoning map; a vision not only of white skeletons but also green palm trees and sapphire seas." G. S. Fraser terms it "an utterly original book" and goes on to write: "There will always be a place for stories like Treasure Island that can keep boys and old men happy."Show book
