Publisher: idb
Flush: A Biography, an imaginative biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's cocker spaniel, is a cross-genre blend of fiction and nonfiction - This unusual biography traces the life of Flush from his carefree existence in the country, to his adoption by Ms. Browning and his travails in London, leading up to his final days in a bucolic Italy.
A sweeping multigenerational saga of the founding of the state of Alaska by an iconic author with more than three hundred million copies of her books in print. Spanning two hundred years, this saga of romance and adventure in the untamed Alaska wilderness begins with Tasha Tarakanov, a beautiful Aleut woman, and her beloved Andrei, a noble and ambitious Cossack hunter. From their union come seven generations of proud Alaskans, including the beautiful Marisha, who finds her fortune as a legendary madam, and Wylie Cole, who bravely defends his homeland during World War II. Glorious and grand, The Great Alone is a story of brave young men and women, whose dreams, heritage, betrayals, loves, and fortitude are as vast and wild as the land from which they sprang.Show book
“A touching coming-of-age story” (Publishers Weekly) in the tradition of Anita Diamant’s The Red Tent, about a young woman, her family, their community and the customs that bind them, from “a storyteller of uncommon energy and poise” (Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times).This vivid saga begins in Yemen in 1920. Adela Damari’s parents’ health is failing as they desperately seek a future husband for their young daughter, who is in danger of becoming adopted by the local Muslim community if she is orphaned. With no likely marriage prospects, Adela’s situation looks dire—until she meets two cousins from faraway cities: a boy with whom she shares her most treasured secret, and a girl who introduces her to the powerful rituals of henna. Ultimately, Adela’s life journey brings her old and new loves, her true calling, and a new life as she is transported to Israel as part of Operation On Wings of Eagles.Rich, evocative, and enthralling, Henna House is an intimate family portrait interwoven with the traditions of the Yemenite Jews and the history of the Holocaust and Israel. This sensuous tale of love, loss, betrayal, forgiveness—and the dyes that adorn the skin and pierce the heart—will captivate readers until the very last page.Show book
Yvain, the Knight of the Lion is a romance by Chrétien de Troyes. It was probably written in the 1170s simultaneously with Lancelot, the Knight of the Cart, and includes several references to the action in that poem. In the poem, Yvain seeks to avenge his cousin Calogrenant who had been defeated by an otherworldly knight beside a magical storm-making fountain in the forest of Broceliande. (Summary from Wikipedia)Show book
Arthur Conan Doyle was born in Edinburgh, Scotland on 22nd May 1859. His childhood was blighted by his father’s heavy drinking which for some years broke up the family. Fortunately, wealthy uncles were willing to support them by paying for education and clothing. He was accepted at the University of Edinburgh to study medicine and also began to write short stories the first, ‘The Haunted Grange of Goresthorpe’, was published in Blackwood’s Magazine. Despite several other stories and some articles in the British Medical Journal his medical studies took priority. When these finished he was appointed as Doctor on the Greenland whaler ‘Hope of Peterhead’ in 1880 and then, after graduation, as ship’s surgeon on the SS Mayumba on its voyage to West Africa. 1882 saw a move to Plymouth and his own independent practice. With few patients he resumed writing and completed his first novel, ‘The Mystery of Cloomber’, although most of his output was short stories based on his experiences at sea. He married Louisa Hawkins in 1885. However, two years later he met and fell in love with Jean Elizabeth Leckie, though they remained platonic out of respect for, and loyalty to, his wife. His literary career suddenly burst into life in November 1886 with ‘A Study In Scarlet’, the first of the fabulously successful Sherlock Holmes stories. With two children to support he now revisited his haphazard commercial arrangements and curtailed everything save for commissions from the Strand Magazine. As a sportsman he was remarkably proficient. He was goalkeeper for Portsmouth Association Football Club and played ten first-class cricket matches for the Marylebone Cricket Club as well as captain of the Crowborough Beacon Golf Club in East Sussex. In 1891 tired of writing Holmes stories, he began a series of historical novels and even went so far as to apparently kill off Holmes in a lethal brawl with his arch-nemesis Moriarty. Despite heavy and sustained criticism he continued to write in support of the Boer War, a fact he thought contributed to his knighthood in 1902. The following year to great relief and acclaim he brought Sherlock Holmes back from the dead in his first outing for a decade. Sadly, his wife Louisa died from TB in 1906 and, a year later, he at last married Jean. During the War and for several years after family deaths had left him depressed. In a search for solace and answers he alighted upon spiritualism and, such was his interest, that he wrote several books on the subject. On 7th July 1930 Conan Doyle was discovered in the hall of Windlesham Manor, his house in East Sussex, clutching his chest dying of a heart attack. He was 71. 01 - Arthur Conan Doyle - A Short Story Collection - An Introduction 02 - The Striped Chest by Arthur Conan Doyle 03 - How It Happened by Arthur Conan Doyle 04 - B24 by Arthur Conan Doyle 05 - The Cabman's Story. The Mystery of a London Growler by Arthur Conan Doyle 06 - The Final Problem by Arthur Conan DoyleShow book
Invitation from a Mobster is inspired by real events. It tells the story of one of the most important and feared journalists of the 1990s and is set during the Wild West Gold Rush era of Czech politics following the Velvet Revolution. Vitas is a journalist who uncovers injustice and crime in the chaos of democratic beginnings in a formerly Communist nation. He works in an environment in which all things are affected by the pursuit of money and all human values fall to the wayside. Vitas uncovers various scams involving by one of the biggest mobsters in the Czech Republic, Kromen. The story moves to Tibet and its forcible annexation during the last century by China. A young girl is being raised in a monastery of Tibetan Buddhists near the Indian border. No one in the monastery has any idea that a destiny of great historical significance lies in wait for her. Because of the girl the monastery becomes a significant source of interest for Chinese officials.Show book
Henry Handel Richardson was the pseudonym of Ethel Florence Lindesay Richardson, a writer who was born in 1870 to a reasonably well-off family which later fell on hard times. The author's family lived in various Victorian towns and from the age of 13 to 17 Richardson attended boarding school at the Presbyterian Ladies' College in Melbourne, Victoria. It's this experience that feeds directly into The Getting of Wisdom. Laura Tweedle Rambotham, the main character, is the eldest child of a country family. She is a clever and highly imaginative child, given to inventing romantic stories for the entertainment of her younger siblings, and an avid reader. She is also both proud and sensitive and her mother finds her difficult to handle. Her mother is the widow of a barrister who supports her family in genteel poverty on her earnings from embroidery. At the age of twelve Laura is sent off to boarding school in Melbourne. Her experiences at school shock and humiliate the unworldly Laura. The girls at the school are generally from rather wealthy families and those, like Laura, who come from less fortunate backgrounds learn very early not to divulge their circumstances for fear of ridicule. From time to time Laura lets little snippets of information about her family slip out, and she suffers for it. (Summary by Wikipedia)Show book
