Publisher: Next Chapter
Phyllis McCranie's ROSES ARE REAL AND OTHER FLASHES OF FICTION is a collection of nineteen short stories which cover a wide range of plots. From the whimsical to family relationships, this collection will appeal to both young and mature adults.
The bookshelves of British literature are incredible collections that have gathered together centuries of very talented authors. From these Isles their fame spread and whilst among their number many are now forgotten or neglected their talents endure. Among them is Walter Besant.Show book
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.Show book
A young girl, renamed Amerika in honour of the US role in the liberation of Kuwait, finds her name has become a barometer of her country's growing hostility towards the West. A self-conscious Palestinian teenager is drawn into a botched suicide bombing by two belligerent classmates. A middle-aged man dying from cancer looks back on his extramarital affairs and the abiding forgiveness of his wife. A Kuwaiti woman returns to her family after being held captive in Iraq for a decade. The headlines tell of war, unrest and religious clashes. But if you look beyond them you will see life in the Middle East as it is really lived – adolescent love, the fragility of marriage, pain of the most quotidian kind. Mai Al-Nakib's luminous stories unveil the lives of ordinary people – and the power of objects to hold extraordinary memories.Show book
We love reason, advancing through facts to reach a conclusion that explains exactly where we are at. When literary masters create their stories on this theme we are left with some quite brilliant and riveting works that help us gain fascinating insight into both author, story and the world beyond. 1 - Philosophical Stories - An Introduction 2 - In the Penal Colony by Franz Kafka 3 - Bartleby the Scrivener - Part 1 by Herman Melville 4 - Bartleby the Scrivener - Part 2 by Herman Melville 5 - The Dream of a Ridiculous Man by Fyodor Dostoyevsky 6 - Parker Adderson, Philosopher by Ambrose Bierce 7 - Dickory Cronke, The Dumb Philosopher or Great Britain's Wonder by Daniel D 8 - Plato's Dream by Voltaire 9 - The Shades, A Phantasy by Vladimir Korolenko 10 - Gods in Exile by Heinrich Heine 11 - An Evening Guest by Alexander Kuprin 12 - Bellerophon To Anteia by Mary Butts 13 - Putois by Anatole France 14 - The Lightning Rod Man by Herman Melville 15 - Moxon's Master by Ambrose Bierce 16 - A Country Doctor by Franz KafkaShow book
Title: The Cask of Amontillado Author: Edgar Allan Poe Narrator: Jonathan Dunne Original Publication: 1846 Public Domain: Yes Series Placement: Number 7 in the Timeless Terrors series Description: The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe is a masterful tale of revenge, deception, and macabre horror. First published in 1846 in Godey’s Lady’s Book, it follows Montresor as he lures the unsuspecting Fortunato into the catacombs beneath an Italian city, promising a taste of rare Amontillado wine. What begins as a seemingly friendly encounter descends into a chilling nightmare of entombment and vengeance. Poe crafts a tightly woven narrative filled with irony, tension, and the psychological darkness for which he is renowned. This recording, narrated by Amazon bestselling horror author Jonathan Dunne, brings to life the Gothic atmosphere and sinister undertones of one of Poe’s most unforgettable stories. While the text is in the public domain, this performance is an original work and copyright © 2025 Jonathan Dunne. Listeners should prepare for an unsettling journey into obsession and retribution that echoes long after the story ends.Show book
Samuel Langhorne Clemens was born in Florida, Missouri on the 30th November 1835 and is far better known by his pen name of Mark Twain. An American writer and humorist of the first order he is perhaps best known for his novels ‘The Adventures of Tom Sawyer’ and its sequel ‘The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’ which are often described with that mythic line The Great American Novel. Twain grew up in Hannibal, Missouri which would later provide the backdrop to these great novels. Apprenticed to a printer he also became a typesetter and then a master riverboat pilot on the Mississippi. Later, heading west with his brother Orion to make his fortune, he failed at gold mining and instead turned to journalism and thence his true calling as a writer of humorous stories where his wit and humor sparkled from every paragraph, his craft evident with every page and punctured target. A staunch supporter of copyright protections this helped him keep much of the wealth his writing created, though much money was also lost on investments that he pursued in his love for science and technology as well as investing in his own inventions. Twain was born during a visit by Halley’s comet, and he predicted that he would go out with it as well. He died the day after its subsequent return on 21st April 1910, at his house, Stormfield, located in Redding, Connecticut.Show book
