Other books that might interest you

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  Bertie's Box

  Louisa May Alcott

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  In Bertie's Box, a family sits around the table putting the finishing touches on their Christmas present wrapping. A letter arrives from a poor widow asking for assistance in providing a Christmas present for her two children. Overhearing this, young Bertie sets about packing up some of his toys to send to the unfortunate mother.

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  The Walled Nun of Avila - A...

  S.G.C. Middlemore

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  An old Spanish ghost story about a former convent which is haunted by a young nun who fell in love and broke her vows. Her punishment was to be walled up alive. Her tormented ghost haunts the cloister...until one day the occupants decide to unbrick the wall where the nun died, and the family find something quite unexpected.

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  The Blackboard Jungle - A Novel

  Evan Hunter

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  The “shocking” and “suspense-packed” bestseller about one teacher’s stand against student violence, and the basis for the Academy Award–nominated film (The New York Times Book Review). After serving his country in World War II, Richard Dadier decides to become an English teacher—and for the sin of wanting to make a difference, he’s hired at North Manual Trades High School. A tough vocational school in the East Bronx, Manual Trades is home to angry, unruly teenagers exiled from New York City’s regular public schools. On his first day, Dadier endures relentless mockery and ridicule and makes an enemy of the student body by rescuing a female colleague from a vicious attack.   His fellow educators are bitter, disillusioned, and too afraid of their pupils to risk turning their backs on them in the classroom. But Dadier refuses to give up without a fight. Over the course of the semester, he tries again and again to break through the wall of hatred and scorn and win his students’ respect. The more he learns about their difficult circumstances, the more convinced he becomes that a good teacher can make a difference in their lives. His idealism will be put to the ultimate test, however, when a long-simmering power struggle with his most intimidating student explodes into a violent schoolroom showdown.   The basis for the blockbuster film starring Glenn Ford and Sidney Poitier, Evan Hunter’s The Blackboard Jungle is a brutal, unflinching look at the dark side of American education and an early masterpiece from the author who went on to write the gritty 87th Precinct series as Ed McBain. Drawn from Hunter’s own experiences as a New York City schoolteacher, it is a “nightmarish but authentic” drama that packs a knockout punch (Time).    

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  So Big

  Edna Ferber

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  The Pulitzer Prize–winning “masterpiece” by the acclaimed author of Giant follows the life of a farming woman on the Illinois prairie (The Literary Review).   In the small Dutch community of New Holland, Illinois, Selina DeJong dedicates herself to her passion for learning by becoming a schoolteacher. But as life progresses, she finds other loves: first, her husband, Pervus, a Dutch farmer; and then her son, Dirk, whom she nicknames “So Big” in reference to the common refrain: “How big is baby? So big!”   Throughout her life, Selina never loses her fondness for learning and art—even as tragedy, loss, the realities of hard work, and the necessity of money threaten to eclipse all else. But as her son grows up to pursue his fortune in Chicago, can she help him retain those same values?  So Big is the story of both a woman and her son, and a country in the midst of profound cultural transition. The winner of the 1925 Pulitzer Prize, it is widely considered author Edna Ferber’s masterpiece.   “It has the completeness, [the] finality, that grips and exalts and convinces.” —The Literary Review

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  A Little Princess

  Frances Hodgson Burnett

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  Sara Crewe, an exceptionally intelligent and imaginative student at Miss Minchin's Select Seminary for Young Ladies, is devastated when her adored, indulgent father dies. Now penniless and banished to a room in the attic, Sara is demeaned, abused, and forced to work as a servant. How this resourceful girl's fortunes change again is at the center of "A Little Princess", one of the best-loved stories in all of children's literature.

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  The Game of Life and How to Play It

  Florence Scovel

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  Florence Scovel Shinn, an illustrator living in New York City, became a teacher of New Thought after a divorce. New Thought was a movement which holds the belief that individuals can create their own reality through intentional thoughts and prayer, much like the current Law of Attraction movement. The Game of Life and How to Play It is her first book, and is remarkable for being written by a woman and meant for a genteel female audience

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