Publisher: Sheba Blake Publishing
The longish short story "Adieu" is an excerpt from Honore de Balzac's sweeping masterpiece The Human Comedy. A ghost story of sorts, this tragic tale recounts the blossoming romance of two lovers whose relationship is torn asunder by the vagaries of war. When they reunite by chance years later, there is nothing left to be salvaged.
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. The final decade of the Century. Britain sits astride the world, her majesty and pomp everywhere. Her industrial might and military muscle the enforcers of her Imperial will. Her authors too have talents that are the envy of all. Mass market publishing are delivering these sparkling pieces to hungry senses everywhere. Genius is written in their names. 1 - The Top 10 - The British - The 1890's - An Introduction 2 - The Fiddler of the Reels by Thomas Hardy 3 - The Magic Shop by H G Wells 4 - The Mark of the Beast by Rudyard Kipling 5 - Lost Hearts by M R James 6 - From the Dead by Edith Nesbit 7 - The Story of B 24 by Arthur Conan Doyle 8 - The Inconsiderate Waiter by J M Barrie 9 - N by Arthur Machen 10 - Passed by Charlotte Mew 11 - A Letter Home by Arnold BennettShow book
Mary Elizabeth Braddon – A Short Story Collection – An Introduction Mary Elizabeth Braddon was born in London on the 4th October 1835. At age 5 her parents separated but her ambition to succeed was not daunted. After being privately educated she took to acting, and the minor roles she obtained where enough to support both her and her mother. This potential career waned as soon as she began writing and secured an income from it. In 1860, she met John Maxwell, a publisher of periodicals, and moved in with him the following year. At the time Maxwell was already married with five children but his wife was confined to an Irish mental asylum. On her death they married and she had six children by him. Braddon was prolific and wrote over 80 novels, perhaps the most famous is ‘Lady Audley's Secret’ (1862), which won her both sales and a fortune as a bestseller. She also wrote a number of historical fiction novels which again increased her reputation. She was equally prolific as a short story writer, primarily supernatural and ghost stories, all of which continue to be anthologized to this day, such is the high regard they are kept in. Braddon founded Belgravia magazine in 1866, its fare being serialised sensation novels, poems, travel narratives and biographies, along with essays on fashion, history and science, all lavishly illustrated. She also edited Temple Bar magazine. Mary Elizabeth Braddon died on 4th February 1915 and is buried in Richmond Cemetery. 1 - Mary Elizabeth Braddon - A Short Story Collection - An Introduction 2 - Colonel Benyon's Entanglement by Mary Elizabeth Braddon 3 - The Cold Embrace by Mary Elizabeth Braddon 4 - The Face in the Glass by Mary Elizabeth Braddon 5 - Eveline's Visitant by Mary Elizabeth Braddon 6 - The Higher Life by Mary Elizabeth BraddonShow book
Title: The Statement of Randolph Carter Author: H. P. Lovecraft Narrator: Jonathan Dunne Original Publication: 1919 Public Domain: Yes Series Placement: Number 11 in the Timeless Terrors series Description: The Statement of Randolph Carter by H. P. Lovecraft is a haunting tale of the unknown and the incomprehensible. First published in 1920 in The Vagrant, it recounts a disturbing testimony given before authorities, where the narrator struggles to explain the fate of his companion. Told as a sworn statement, the story unfolds through Carter’s account of a midnight exploration of a graveyard and the horrifying events that follow. As his friend descends into a crypt, strange sounds and an overwhelming sense of dread mount, culminating in a final revelation that suggests forces far beyond human understanding. This recording, narrated by Amazon bestselling horror author Jonathan Dunne, captures the eerie tension and creeping inevitability that defines Lovecraft’s early fiction. While the text is in the public domain, this performance is an original work and copyright © 2025 Jonathan Dunne. Listeners should be prepared for an unsettling meditation on forbidden knowledge, cosmic dread, and the terrifying mysteries that lie buried in the dark.Show book
Stephen P H Butler Leacock FRSC was born on the 30th December 1869 in Swanmore, near Southampton, England, the third of eleven children. The family emigrated to Canada in 1876 to live on a 100-acre farm in Sutton, Ontario. There Leacock was home-schooled and later enrolled into the elite private school Upper Canada College in Toronto. Academically he was very strong and enrolled at the University of Toronto to study languages and literature. He left there after his alcoholic father abandoned the family and finances were too stretched to continue his attendance. He now enrolled in a three-month course at Strathroy Collegiate Institute to become a qualified high school teacher and with it a regular income. Leacock published humorous articles in many Canadian and US magazines but his real passion was economics and political theory. In 1899 he enrolled for postgraduate studies at the University of Chicago and earned his PhD in 1903. His marriage to Beatrix Hamilton produced a single child 15 years later. Over time father and son developed a love-hate relationship, partially caused by his son’s diminutive stature of only four feet. He accepted a post at McGill University and kept it until he retired in 1936. His work ‘Elements of Political Science’, was adopted as a standard textbook for two decades and was also his most profitable. He now also began public speaking and lecturing. In 1910, he privately printed some articles as ‘Literary Lapses’. It was then released by a recognised publisher, and he became a commercially successful writer. His collections of light-hearted whimsy, parody, nonsense, and satire were now frequently published along with biographies and several award-winning volumes on Canada. Politically Leacock was a difficult creature. He opposed women’s right to vote, was a champion of Empire but advocated social welfare legislation and wealth redistribution, but he often caused friction with his racist views. Leacock has been forgotten as an economist, but it’s often said that in 1911 more people had heard of him than had heard of Canada. For the decade after 1915 Leacock was the most popular humorist in the English-speaking world. Stephen Leacock died on 28th March 1944 of throat cancer in Toronto, Canada. He was 74.Show book
What happens when the hot bodybuilder wants to bend the curvy girl like a flexi-straw? He's a personal trainer with a chiseled body who hustles in and out of the gym to take care of his mother and sister. She's a confident curvy girl who runs a plus size online clothing boutique and YouTube fashion channel, using a three-day pass at the fitness resort. She's everything he wants in a woman: smart, confident, and driven with luscious curves to hold on to. Their attraction is instant and undeniable, but will she want him once she learns about his hustling? It might be his past, but he sees no future without her. Can he convince her to be his one and only, giving them their happily ever after?Show book
Title: The Tomb Author: H. P. Lovecraft Narrator: Jonathan Dunne Original Publication: 1917 (first published 1922) Public Domain: Yes Series Placement: Number 26 in the Timeless Terrors series Description: The Tomb by H. P. Lovecraft is a tale of ancestral obsession, forbidden curiosity, and the thin veil separating memory from madness. It follows Jervas Dudley, a solitary dreamer fascinated by an ancient mausoleum belonging to the long-dead Hyde family. Drawn by an irresistible pull, he becomes consumed by the mystery of the tomb — and by the eerie sense that his destiny is entwined with the dead within. Through Lovecraft’s early mastery of gothic atmosphere and psychological unease, The Tomb explores themes of hereditary memory, morbid fixation, and the haunting persistence of the past. What begins as mere curiosity descends into a dreamlike horror, where identity and sanity unravel among the shadows of the grave. Narrated by Amazon bestselling horror author Jonathan Dunne, this performance evokes the dark romanticism and creeping dread of Lovecraft’s vision — a descent into the spectral corridors of the mind. While the text resides in the public domain, this narration is an original work and copyright © 2025 Jonathan Dunne. Part of Timeless Terrors, a series devoted to reviving the classic works of horror and the uncanny, The Tomb bridges gothic tradition and cosmic dread — a haunting meditation on the lure of the past and the peril of those who cannot let the dead rest. Listeners should prepare for a story where fascination becomes fate, where dreams trespass upon death, and where the past itself refuses to stay buried.Show book
