Biographical fiction / autobiographical fiction
Penguin Books Ltd Don Quixote
Book SynopsisDon Quixote has become so entranced by reading romances of chivalry that he determines to become a knight errant and pursue bold adventures, accompanied by his squire, the cunning Sancho Panza. As they roam the world together, the aging Quixote's fancy leads them wildly astray.
£10.44
Penguin Books Ltd Madame Bovary Provincial Lives Penguin Classics
Book SynopsisThe notorious and celebrated novel that established modern realism For this novel of French bourgeois life in all its inglorious banality, Flaubert invented a paradoxically original and wholly modern style. His heroine, Emma Bovary, a bored provincial housewife, abandons her husband to pursue the libertine Rodolphe in a desperate love affair. A succès de scandale in its day, Madame Bovary remains a powerful and scintillating novel.This Penguin Classics edition is translated with notes and an introduction by Geoffrey Wall. It includes a preface by Michele Roberts. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by dTrade Review"Madame Bovary is like the railroad stations erected in its epoch: graceful, even floral, but cast of iron." -- John Updike
£8.54
Penguin Books Ltd Despair Vladimir Nabokov Penguin Modern Classics
Book Synopsis''A work of rapture - jolting, hilarious and incredibly racy'' Martin Amis, The TimesSelf-satisfied, delighting in the many fascinating quirks of his own personality, Hermann Hermann is perhaps not to be taken too seriously. But then a chance meeting with Felix, a man he believes to be his double, reveals a frightening ''split'' in Hermann''s nature. Convinced that he has found his doppelgänger, Hermann uses this discovery to weave a money-making plan that leads to disguise, betrayal and eventually murder. Filled with impudent, startling humour, and dominated by the egotistical and scornful figure of a killer who thinks himself an artist, Despair takes us into a deranged world of doubles and illusions, where nothing is quite as it seems.
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd Madame Bovary
Book SynopsisEmma Bovary is beautiful and bored, trapped in her marriage to a mediocre doctor and stifled by the banality of provincial life. An ardent reader of sentimental novels, she longs for passion and seeks escape in fantasies of high romance, in voracious spending and, eventually, in adultery. But even her affairs bring her disappointment and the consequences are devastating. Flaubert''s erotically charged and psychologically acute portrayal of Emma Bovary caused a moral outcry on its publication in 1857. It was deemed so lifelike that many women claimed they were the model for his heroine; but Flaubert insisted: ''Madame Bovary, c''est moi''.Trade Review"Madame Bovary is like the railroad stations erected in its epoch: graceful, even floral, but cast of iron." -- John Updike
£15.29
Penguin Books Ltd Middlemarch Penguin Classics S
Book SynopsisGeorge Eliot's Victorian masterpiece: a magnificent portrait of a provincial town and its inhabitantsGeorge Eliot’s novel, Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life, explores a fictional nineteenth-century Midlands town in the midst of modern changes. The proposed Reform Bill promises political change; the building of railroads alters both the physical and cultural landscape; new scientific approaches to medicine incite public division; and scandal lurks behind respectability. The quiet drama of ordinary lives and flawed choices are played out in the complexly portrayed central characters of the novel—the idealistic Dorothea Brooke; the ambitious Dr. Lydgate; the spendthrift Fred Vincy; and the steadfast Mary Garth. The appearance of two outsiders further disrupts the town’s equilibrium—Will Ladislaw, the spirited nephew of Dorothea’s husband, the Rev. Edward Casaubon, and the sinister John Raffles, who threatens to exposTrade Review"One of the few English novels written for grown-up people" -- Virginia Woolf"The most profound, wise and absorbing of English novels...and, above all, truthful and forgiving about human behavior." -- Hermione Lee
£8.99
Penguin Books Ltd Melmoth the Wanderer Charles Maturin The Penguin
Book SynopsisThe Penguin English Library Edition of Melmoth the Wanderer by Charles Maturin''My hour is come ... the clock of eternity is about to strike, but its knell must be unheard by mortal ears!''This violent, profound, baroque and blackly humorous novel is the story of Melmoth, who has sold his soul in exchange for immortality in a satanic bargain, and now preys on the helpless in their darkest moments, offering to ease their suffering if they will take his place and release him from his centuries of tortured wanderings. Melmoth the Wanderer (1820) blended Gothic fiction and psychological realism to create a work of hallucinatory power.The Penguin English Library - beautiful editions of the best fiction in English, from the eighteenth century to the Second World War.
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Krull House
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewVintage Simenon, a dark masterpiece . . . A calmly, almost diffidently narrated yet terrifying study of race hatred and mass hysteria, it was eerily prophetic * Guardian *Simenon lays out with ruthless exactitude the way selfish, conscience-free greed exploits modest, hospitable decency . . . The world of Chez Krull is a common, shared one . . . the world of the immigrant, of navigating cautiously in a foreign country * London Review of Books *Fierce, bleak and compellingly written . . . with pitiless landscapes of hopeless longing, random cruelty and galloping fate warmed only by the twilit lyricism of doomed desire. These are novels of eye-opening, spine-tingling control and intensity. * The Independent *Seriously good * Evening Standard *
£8.99
Penguin Books Ltd Summer Will Show Penguin Modern Classics
Book Synopsis''A novel of love, war and death; brilliantly entertaining and far ahead of its time'' Guardian ''She is my husband''s mistress - and here am I, taking her out to dinner''Sophia Willoughby of Blandamer House, upstanding Victorian matriarch, has packed her errant husband off to Paris with his mistress Minna. But when tragedy throws her life off balance Sophia goes to seek him out, and instead finds herself intensely attracted to the charismatic, bohemian Minna, who leads her on a wild, chaotic adventure through a city in the throes of revolution.''One of the great under-read British novelists of the twentieth century. This is my favourite of her novels'' Sarah Waters''Every page contains something brilliant, arresting or amusing, and one comes away from it staggered'' Claire HarmanTrade ReviewSylvia Townsend Warner has to be one of the great under-read British novelists of the twentieth century. This, my favourite of her novels, has a disaffected Victorian wife falling for her husband's charismatic mistress, and discovering revolutionary politics along the way -- Sarah WatersIt's a wildly leftist novel of love, war and death; Townsend Warner chucks the lot into her simmering story, but it remains skilfully crafted. Brilliantly entertaining and far ahead of its time * Guardian *With insight, malice, exquisiteness; in its wit, its instinct for style, its drawing-room urbanities, it will suggest at one time or another the work of a Rebecca West, a Virginia Woolf, an Elinor Wylie * The New York Times *
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd Unquiet
Book Synopsis''Linn Ullmann has written something of beauty and solace and truth. I don''t know how she managed to sail across such dangerous waters'' RACHEL CUSKHe is a renowned Swedish filmmaker and has a plan for everything. She is his daughter, by the actress he directed and once loved. Each summer of her childhood, the daughter visits the father at his remote Faro island home on the edge of the Baltic Sea.Now that she''s grown up - a writer, with children of her own - and he''s in his eighties, they envision writing a book together, about old age, language, memory and loss. She will ask the questions. He will answer them. The tape recorder will record.But it''s winter now and old age has caught up with him in ways neither could have foreseen. And when the father is gone, only memories, images and words -- both remembered and recorded - remain. And from these the daughter begins to write her own story, in the pages which become this book.Heart-breaking Trade ReviewLinn Ullmann has written something of beauty and solace and truth. I don't know how she managed to sail across such dangerous waters * Rachel Cusk *This magnificent, elegant work is pure tour de force... one of the best things I've read in a long, long time * Ali Smith *[An] exquisite and warm novel ... Among Norway's contemporary writers, Ullmann might be the finest sentence by sentence * John Freeman *Unquiet is a wonderfully absorbing and moving family story told with a directness, naturalness, and grace that can only result from Linn Ullmann's close attention to the eloquent details of day-to-day life, her honest embrace of herself and the people close to her, and a keen sensitivity to language and the high demands of good writing * Lydia Davis *I've long admired Linn Ullmann's fiction, and Unquiet is her masterpiece. Based on her upbringing as the child of two great artists, it is the portrait of complex loves; of a youth divided and inspired by diametrically opposed creative influences; and of the ravages of age. Calm yet fierce, exquisitely rendered, this novel imprints itself indelibly?as if you, too, had been there * Claire Messud *Ullmann navigates the dangerous and fissile territory... with great power. I am in awe * Edmund de Waal *Effortlessly lucid, full of grace and restraint * Sunday Times *A powerful and unsettling hybrid of memoir, fiction and meditation ... The work of a lifetime * Guardian *
£8.54
Penguin Books Ltd The True Heart
Book Synopsis ''The kind of novelist who inspires an intense sense of ownership in her fans ... her sympathies tended naturally to the marginal, the vulnerable, the exploited, the obscure'' Sarah WatersSukey Bond, a sixteen-year-old orphan, is sent to work as a servant at a farm on the remote Essex Marshes. There she falls in love with gentle, unworldly Eric, the son of the rector''s wife, only for them to be separated when their relationship is discovered. But nothing will deter Sukey in her quest to be reunited with her true love, even if it means seeking the help of Queen Victoria herself.''One of our most idiosyncratic, courageous and versatile writers'' Hermione Lee ''One can''t be too thankful that Miss Townsend Warner has lived to discover the alchemist''s secret of transmuting the past into pure gold'' Hilary SpurlingTrade ReviewThe kind of novelist who inspires an intense sense of ownership in her fans ... though entirely without sentimentality, her sympathies tended naturally to the marginal, the vulnerable, the exploited, the obscure -- Sarah WatersOne of our most idiosyncratic, courageous and versatile writers -- Hermione Lee
£10.44
Penguin Books Ltd Lies and Sorcery
Book Synopsis
£999.99
Penguin Books Ltd Nothing Grows by Moonlight
Book Synopsis ''Breathtakingly powerful'' Guardian ''This startling, absorbing book will leave you fizzing with anger and possibility'' Noreen Masud A hauntingly beautiful, unforgettable Norwegian classic, ripe for discoveryIn the blue dusk of a spring evening, a man is drawn to a lonely, beautiful stranger across a station platform. She follows him home, and over one heady night of wine and cigarettes, recounts to him the devastating story of her life . . .First published in 1947, Nothing Grows by Moonlight tells the haunting tale of one woman's soul-shattering love affair. When an obsessive passion for her high school teacher consumes a small-town seventeen-year-old, her life spirals out of control, giving way to pregnancy, poverty and alienation. Here, darkness and light converge, and unrequited love blooms against the shadows of societal injustices, as she fights for autonomy: over her life, her mind and her body.Captivating, visceral and brimming with emotion, Nothing Grows by Moonlight is a feminist classic of Scandinavian literature, and an uncompromising ode to female desire.
£11.69
Penguin Books Ltd (UK) The Genius
Book Synopsis90 classic titles celebrating 90 years of Penguin BooksKnown as Ireland's Chekhov, Frank O'Connor was a master of the modern short story, with an eye for capturing the spaces between our selves and our surroundings. The Genius brings together some of his very best stories, often told from the perspective of young children and forming a revealing portrait of coming of age in postwar Ireland. Humorous and poignant in equal parts, these stories are a lesson in craft from a celebrated, prolific author.
£5.99
WW Norton & Co The Arabian Nights
Book SynopsisThis Norton Critical Edition includes twenty-eight tales from The Arabian Nights translated by Husain Haddawy on the basis of the oldest existing Arabic manuscript.Trade Review"A fine new translation. Bawdy, colloquial and wondrously inventive." -- Michiko Kakutani - New York Times"Easily the clearest, most fluent and readable translation." -- A. S. Byatt - Sunday Times [London]"The resourceful Shahrazad has never been more entertaining than in this fresh and vigorous version of this immortal book." -- Doris Lessing - The Independent"A distinguished new translation." -- Edward Said - The Nation"Indispensable. Not a new version of an old favorite, but a work we’ve never known." -- Geoffrey O'Brien - Voice Literary SupplementTable of ContentsPreface A Note on the Text The Text of The Arabian Nights 1. Foreword 2. Prologue 3. [The Story of King Shahrayar and Shahrazad, His Vizier's Daughter] 4. [The Tale of the Ox and the Donkey] 5. [The Tale of the Merchant and His Wife] 6. [The Story of the Merchant and the Demon] 7. [The First Old Man's Tale] 8. [The Second Old Man's Tale] 9. [The Tale of King Yunan and the Sage Duban] 10. [The Tale of the Husband and the Parrot] 11. [The Tale of the King's Son and the She-Ghoul] 12. [The Tale of the Enchanted King] 13. [The Story of the Porter and the Three Ladies] 14. [The First Dervish's Tale] 15. [The Second Dervish's Tale] 16. [The Tale of the Envious and the Envied] 17. [The Third Dervish's Tale] 18. [The Tale of the First Lady, the Mistress of the House] 19. [The Tale of the Second Lady, the Flogged One] 20. [The Story of the Three Apples] 21. [The Story of the Two Viziers, Nur al-Din Ali al-Misri and Bar al-Din Hasan al-Basri] 22. [The Story of the Hunchback] 23. [The Christian Broker's Tale: The Young Man with the Severed Hand and the Girl] 24. [The Steward's Tale: The Young Man from Baghdad and Lady Zubaida's Maid] 25. [The Tailor's Tale: The Lame Young Man from Baghdad and the Barber] 26. [The Tale of the Second Brother, Baqbaqa the Paraplegic] 27. [The Tale of the Fifth Brother, the Cropped of Ears] 28. [The Story of Jullanar of the Sea] 29. [The Story of Sindbad the Sailor] Contexts Early Witnesses Anonymous • A Ninth-Century Fragment of the Thousand Nights Al Mas'ûdi • Meadows of Gold (Murûj al-Dhahab) Ibn Ishâq Al-Nadîm • The Fihrist Modern Echoes Edgar Allan Poe • The Thousand-and-Second Tale of Scheherazade Marcel Proust • From Remembrance of Things Past Taha Husayn • From The Dreams of Scheherazade Criticism Hugo von Hofmannsthal • A Thousand and One Nights Josef Horovitz • The Origins of The Arabian Nights Jorge Luis Borges • The Translators of The Thousand and One Nights Francesco Gabrieli • The Thousand and One Nights in European Culture Mia Irene Gerhardt • From The Art of Story-Telling Tzvetan Todorov • Narrative Men Andras Hamori • A Comic Romance from The Thousand and One Nights: The Tale of Two Viziers Heinz Grotzfeld • Neglected Conclusions of The Arabian Nights Jerome W. Clinton • Madness and Cure in the 1001 Nights Abdelfattah Kilito • The Eye and the Needle David Pinault • Story-Telling Techniques in The Arabian Nights The Arabian Nights: A Chronology Selected Bibliography
£14.99
Faber & Faber Belgrave Road
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£15.29
MacMillan Collector's Library Frankenstein
Book Synopsis
£9.49
Pan Macmillan Poems for Christmas
Book SynopsisJudith Flanders is the author of the bestselling The Victorian House: Domestic Life from Childbirth to Deathbed; A Circle of Sisters, which was nominated for the Guardian First Book Award; the New York Times bestselling The Invention of Murder, shortlisted for the CWA Gold Dagger for Non-fiction; The Victorian City: Everyday Life in Dickens' London, shortlisted for the Los Angeles Times History Book of the Year; The Making of Home; and Christmas: A Biography. In her leisure time, she also writes the Sam Clair series of comic crime novels.
£10.44
Pan Macmillan The History Man
Book SynopsisMalcolm Bradbury was a well-known novelist, critic and academic, and founder of the creative writing department at the University of East Anglia. He was the author of seven novels, including The History Man and Rates of Exchange, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. He was awarded a knighthood in 2000 and died later the same year.
£9.49
Arcturus Publishing Sherlock Holmes
Book SynopsisArthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) began writing stories while waiting for patients in his medical practice. His greatest creation, Sherlock Holmes (partly based on the character of his old university teacher), first came to the attention of the public in 1886 with the publication of A Study in Scarlet.Sidney Paget (1860-1908) was a popular British illustrator, best known for his illustrations that accompanied Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories in The Strand magazine.Martin Edwards is recognized as one of Britain's most exciting crime writers and has created two highly successful crime series as well as authored some 40 crime shorts. Martin is a member of the Murder Squad collective of crime writers and is chairman of the nominations sub-committee for the CWA Diamond Dagger, crime writing's most prestigious award.
£16.99
Arcturus Publishing The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
Book SynopsisSir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) was a writer and physician. Born in Edinburgh in Scotland, he beganwriting short stories while studying medicine. His first work featuring Sherlock Holmes, A Study in Scarlet, was published in 1886. Relentlessly curious about a vast range of subjects, his interests were reflected in the vast array of knowledge that Sherlock Holmes exhibited in his stories. Conan Doyle died at the age of 71 and is buried in Hampshire.Sidney Paget (1860-1908) was a popular British illustrator, best known for his illustrations that accompanied Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories in The Strand magazine.
£8.54
Arcturus Publishing The Complete Anne of Green Gables Collection
Book SynopsisL.M. Montgomery (1874-1942) was a Canadian author best known for her Anne of Green Gables series. Montgomery published 20 novels, more than 500 short stories and poems, and 30 essays during her lifetime. Her work, diaries and letters have been loved, read and studied by readers worldwide.
£39.99
Union Square & Co. The Great Gatsby and Other Classic Works
Book SynopsisThis attractively designed edition of the classic novel set in the Roaring Twenties is bound in genuine bonded leather, with gilt-edged pages and a ribbon marker.
£31.50
Union Square & Co. Orlando
Book SynopsisThe fictional portrait of Woolf's close friend and lover Vita Sackville-West, the hero Orlando is a young nobleman in Elizabethan England, a dreamy and romantic youth who wakes up one day to find himself transformed, astonishingly, into a woman.
£8.99
Union Square & Co. The Phantom of the Opera
Book Synopsis
£7.99
Union Square & Co. A Christmas Carol and Other Tales
Book Synopsis
£17.10
Union Square & Co. Les Misérables
Book Synopsis
£21.09
Pan Macmillan The Right Time: A Compelling Story Of Betrayal
Book SynopsisFilled with heartbreak, betrayal and triumph, The Right Time is an uplifting story about pursuing your passion – from the world’s favourite storyteller, Danielle Steel.Abandoned by her mother at age seven, Alexandra Winslow takes solace in the mysteries she reads with her devoted father. Soon she is writing them herself, with a talent far beyond her years. After her father’s untimely death, Alex is taken in by the nuns of a local convent, who encourage her to follow her dream.Alex writes in every spare moment and completes her first novel in college. It’s quickly snapped up by a publisher, but Alex, remembering her late father’s advice, insists on writing under a male pseudonym, with her true identity known only to a few.Success comes easily to Alex, but its toll is heavy. Her secret life as the mysterious Alexander Green exposes her to the envious, the arrogant, and the Hollywood players who have no idea who she really is.The right time to open up always seems just out of reach. But once Alex's double life is revealed, the truth could have devastating consequences . . .
£8.99
Gemini Books Group Ltd George Orwells Animal Farm
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£999.99
Arcturus Publishing Ltd The Mark Twain Collection
Book SynopsisThis deluxe clothbound boxset contains Mark Twain''s most beloved novels and stories: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer; The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn; A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur''s Court; The Prince and the Pauper; Tom Sawyer Abroad; Tom Sawyer, Detective; Pudd''nhead Wilson; and The Mysterious Stranger, complete and unabridged. Each hardcover book is bound in high-quality cloth, with a beautifully embossed cover. The bright color scheme and contemporary designs (with matching color endsheets) make this Mark Twain Collection an instant collectible, perfect for both long-time Twain fans or for young adult readers who are just beginning to discover the genius of the famed American humorist. All six volumes fit handsomely into a matching hardcover slip-case with luxurious cloth finishes on the top and bottom, making it perfect gift or collectable for display.
£39.99
Pushkin Press The Journey to the East
Book SynopsisA classic meditation on artistic creation and the quest for spiritual transcendence from the Nobel Prize-winning author of Siddhartha
£9.49
Canelo Biggles Flies East
Book SynopsisBiggles turns double agent!Biggles is in London on leave from the Front when he is approached by a stranger who greets him as Captain Brunow'. Curious, Biggles plays along with the mistaken identity, and is quickly offered the chance to become a spy for the Germans!Reporting the encounter to Air Staff Intelligence, Biggles is encouraged to seize the opportunity and find out all he can about a German known only as El Shereef, operating somewhere in PalestineBiggles soon finds himself in Zabala, a German aerodrome in Palestine, reporting to Count von Fauborg of the German Secret Service and his chief of staff, one Erich von Stalhein the first appearance of Biggles' greatest nemesis. As Biggles draws closer to unmasking El Shereef, at all times he must ensure his own identity is never revealed, or he will be shot as a spy.A tense, thrilling Biggles espionage adventure in the deserts of the Levant.
£11.69
HarperCollins Publishers Inc The Jungle Book MinaLima Edition Illustrated with
Book SynopsisTrade Review"With jungle maps and spinning dials, this edition has more than just the bare necessities." -- Shelf Awareness "The 256 pages are brimming with lavish and lush full-color illustrations and nine interactive elements...this must-have collectible is unlike any edition currently being sold and can be enjoyed by readers of all ages." -- Examiner.com
£22.50
HarperCollins Publishers Jacobs Room
Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics.JACOB'S ROOM, Virginia Woolf's third novel, marks her first foray into Modernist experimentation. The narrative traces Jacob's childhood in Cornwall and his education at Cambridge, culminating in an evocative portrait of his adult life in London and abroad. Jacob is romantically torn between the artistic Florinda, the upper-middle-class Clara Durrant and the beautiful, but married, Sandra Wentworth Williams. This tissue of romance, though, is torn apart by the cataclysmic events of the First World War. Woolf poignantly depicts the life of Jacob through a sequence of alternating perspectives that combine letters, fragments of dialogue and the ephemeral impressions of those nearest to him. Jacob's voice becomes the absent centre of one of Modernism's first great novels.
£5.62
HarperCollins Publishers Towards Zero
Book SynopsisAn elderly widow is murdered at a clifftop seaside houseWhat is the connection between a failed suicide attempt, a wrongful accusation of theft against a schoolgirl, and the romantic life of a famous tennis player?To the casual observer, apparently nothing. But when a houseparty gathers at Gull's Point, the seaside home of an elderly widow, earlier events come to a dramatic head.It's all part of a carefully paid plan for murderTrade Review“Masterly storytelling”Times Literary Supplement “Agatha Christie has surpassed herself”New York Times
£9.49
Union Square & Co. Les Miserables Barnes Noble Collectible Editions
Book SynopsisLes Miserables was the crowning literary achievement of Victor Hugo's career. An enormous melodrama set against the background of political upheaval in France following the rule of Napoleon I, the novel tells the story of the peasant Jean Valjean - unjustly imprisoned and hounded by his nemesis, the magnificently realized police detective, Javert.
£36.00
HarperCollins Publishers The Enchanted April
Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present a range of best-loved, essential classics.
£5.62
Tuttle Publishing The Three Kingdoms Volume 1 The Sacred Oath
Book SynopsisTrade Review"The Three Kingdoms is considered the ultimate book on strategy, offering keen insights into Chinese culture. Ron Iverson's effort is a great contribution to the understanding of Chinese culture and history." --Xinmin Wang, former Consul for Cultural Affairs for the PRC and advisor to the President of China"This translation faithfully conveys a native Chinese-speaking person's understanding of this most influential and famous Chinese book. To translate this Chinese classic into modern English is a challenging and difficult job for any language translator. However, this joint effort by Yu Sumei and Ronald Iverson has met the challenge." --Hua Xin, former advisor and translator for IBM China"One of the greatest and best-loved works of popular literature." --Dictionary of Oriental Literatures
£13.49
HarperCollins Publishers A Tale of Two Cities Collins Classics
Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics.''It was the best of times, it was the worst of times''Set before and during the French Revolution in the cities of Paris and London, A Tale of Two Cities tells the story of Dr Manette''s release from imprisonment in the Bastille and his reunion with daughter, Lucie. A French aristocrat Darnay and English lawyer Carton compete in their love for Lucie and the ensuing tale plays out against the menacing backdrop of the French Revolution and the shadow of the guillotine.
£5.62
Alma Books Ltd The Wall
Book SynopsisFirst published in 1939, a few years before his most influential works in theatre and philosophy, The Wall was Sartre's first and only collection of short fiction.Trade ReviewA glance at Andrew Brown's excellent translation of The Wall and/or at the French text shows us at once what we've been missing, and the glance very quickly turns to a long look. It's hard to stop reading -- Justin Cartwright
£8.54
Oxford University Press Silas Marner The Weaver of Raveloe
Book SynopsisFalsely accused of theft, Silas Marner is cut off from his community but finds refuge in the village of Raveloe, where he is eyed with distant suspicion. Like a spider from a fairy-tale, Silas fills fifteen monotonous years with weaving and accumulating gold. The son of the wealthy local Squire, Godfrey Cass also seeks an escape from his past. One snowy winter, two events change the course of their lives: Silas's gold is stolen and, a child crawls across his threshold. About the Series For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more. Combining the qualities of a fable with a rich evocation of rural life in the early yeTable of ContentsIntroduction Note on the Text Select Bibliography A Chronology of George Eliot Silas Marner: The Weaver of Raveloe Selected Variants Explanatory Notes
£7.44
Penguin Books Ltd Monkey
Book SynopsisAlso known as Journey to the West, Wu Ch''êng-ên''s Monkey is one of the Four Great Classical Novels in Chinese literature, translated by Arthur Waley in Penguin Classics. Monkey depicts the adventures of Prince Tripitaka, a young Buddhist priest on a dangerous pilgrimage to India to retrieve sacred scriptures accompanied by his three unruly disciples: the greedy pig creature Pipsy, the river monster Sandy - and Monkey. Hatched from a stone egg and given the secrets of heaven and earth, the irrepressible trickster Monkey can ride on the clouds, become invisible and transform into other shapes - skills that prove very useful when the four travellers come up against the dragons, bandits, demons and evil wizards that threaten to prevent them in their quest. Wu Ch''êng-ên wrote Monkey in the mid-sixteenth century, adding his own distinctive style to an ancient Chinese legend, and in so doing created a dazzling combination of nonsense with profundity,
£9.49
HarperCollins Publishers Arabian Nights Collins Classics
Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics.For, said he, there never was nor is there one chaste woman upon the face of earth.'A collection of Persian, Arabian and Indian tales dating from the 9th century, Sir Richard Burton's most well-known translation of Arabian Nights brings together ancient folklore and stories passed down from generation to generation.Featuring tales about love, history, tragedy and comedy as well as fables and fairy tales, this edition remains a well-loved collection of exotic and evocative stories. Fantastical and curious customs are bought to life by Burton's translation in stories such as The Lovers of Bassorah', The Concubine of Al-Maamun' and The Hunchback's Tale'.
£5.62
Oxford University Press The Small House at Allington The Chronicles of
Book Synopsis''She had resolved to trust in everything, and, having so trusted, she would not provide for herself any possibility of retreat.''Lively and attractive, Lily Dale lives with her mother and sister at the Small House at Allington. She falls passionately in love with the urbane Adolphus Crosbie, and is devastated when he abandons her for the aristocratic Lady Alexandrina de Courcy. But Lily has another suitor, Johnny Eames, who has been devoted to her since boyhood. Perhaps she can find renewed happiness in Johnny''s courtship?The Small House at Allington was among the most successful of Trollope''s Barsetshire novels, and has retained its popularity among modern readers. Lily Dale''s stubborn constancy is a troubling reflection of Trollope''s divided feelings about the need for progress and reform in the context of liberal thought and politics. Her story is a subtle exploration of loyalty and ambition, and the pressure for change in a rapidly evolving world. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.Trade ReviewDinah Birch's edition draws on important recent scholarship. * Matthew Ingleby, The Times Literary Supplement *
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd Seven Gothic Tales
Book SynopsisRomantics, adventurers, sensualists, melancholics and dreamers inhabit the bizarre and exotic world conjured up in these seven intricately interwoven tales, whose settings range from Tuscany and Elsinore, to a dhow on its way from Lamu to Zanzibar.Proclaimed a masterpiece on its publication in 1934, this collection is shot through with themes of love and desire - from the maiden lady who now believes herself to have been the grand courtesan of her time, to the Count whose wife is so jealous that she cannot bear him to admire her jewels, and Lincoln Forsner, an Englishman whose search for a woman he met in a brothel leads him into many strange adventures.
£9.99
Penguin Books Ltd On Heroes and Tombs
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewA book with some claim to be the first major set-piece in that carnival of fictional fireworks which mesmerized Latin America throughout the next decade. It offers a rich motherlode of imagery, language and haunting scenes -- Salman RushdieBewitched, baroque, monumental * Newsweek *A novelist of immense power ... uncompromising and original -- Colm Tóibín * Guardian *
£10.44
Oxford University Press The Complete Short Stories
Book SynopsisWilde's short fiction includes such masterpieces as 'The Happy Prince', 'The Selfish Giant', 'Lord Arthur Savile's Crime' and 'The Canterville Ghost', as well as the daring narrative experiments of 'The Portrait of Mr. W. H.' and 'Poems in Prose'. This edition shows how they continue to the enthral and challenge the reader.Trade ReviewI defy anyone to read them and be unmoved. * Emily Labram, The Observer *Table of ContentsPOEMS IN PROSE; APPENDIX
£7.59
HarperCollins Publishers Fools and Mortals
Book SynopsisA dramatic departure for the #1 bestseller. A gripping story of rivalry and ambition, loyalty and love set in the heart of Elizabethan England.With all the vivid history that is his trademark, Bernard Cornwell transports the readers to the playhouses, backstreets and palaces of Shakespeare''s London with added depth and compassion' Philippa GregoryIn the heart of Elizabethan England, young Richard Shakespeare dreams of a glittering career in the London playhouses, dominated by his older brother, William. But as a penniless actor with a silver tongue, Richard's onetime gratitude begins to sour, as does his family loyalty.So it is that Richard falls under suspicion when a priceless manuscript goes missing, forcing him into a high-stakes game of duplicity and betrayal, and through the darkest alleyways of the city.In this richly portrayed tour de force, Fools and Mortals takes you among the streets and palaces, scandals and rivalries, and lets you stand side-by-side with the men and womenTrade Review‘Sharp and funny … His combination of wit, adventure and deft characterisation succeeds triumphantly’ THE TIMES ‘Fools and Mortals is a delight. Witty and knowledgeable in its evocation of Shakespearean London … highly enjoyable’ BBC HISTORY MAGAZINE ‘Cornwell not only succeeds in creating an engaging story, but also in celebrating the difficulties and delights, at any time in history, of putting on a show’ THE SUNDAY TIMES ‘Cornwell leads us effortlessly through palaces and playhouses with the skill of a master storyteller who loves this period of history’ DAILY EXPRESS ‘With all the vivid history that is his trademark, Bernard Cornwell transports the readers to the playhouses, backstreets and palaces of Shakespeare's London with added depth and compassion, and a likeable hero’ Philippa Gregory ‘A cracking novel … the atmosphere and intrigues of this dangerous time are vividly realised. A smash hit’ THE TIMES ‘Story and characters crackle off the page as do the stink and violence of Elizabethan London. The author of the Sharpe and Last Kingdom bestsellers has pulled off a surprise for his readers — and a terrific one at that’ Elizabeth Buchan, DAILY MAIL The Times Saturday Review Book of the Month ‘Cornwell is an enthusiastic amateur dramatist. His portrayal of the actors’ rivalries and superstitions is sharp and often funny. His combination of wit, adventure and deft characterisation is a triumphant departure from his usual territory’ THE TIMES ‘Cornwell mixes the dark realities of history with pacy dialogue … vividly entertaining’ DAILY EXPRESS Praise for Bernard Cornwell: 'Strong narrative, vigourous action and striking characterisation, Cornwell remains king of the territory he has staked out as his own' SUNDAY TIMES ‘Cornwell draws a fascinating picture of England as it might have been before anything like England existed’ THE TIMES ‘He’s called a master storyteller. Really he’s cleverer than that’ TELEGRAPH
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd On the Road The Original Scroll Penguin Modern
Book SynopsisFive decades after it was first published, Jack Kerouac''s seminal Beat novel On the Road finally finds its way to the big screen, in a production from award-winning director Walter Salles (Motorcycle Diaries) starring Sam Riley (Control, Brighton Rock), Garret Hedlund (Friday Night Lights), Kristen Stewart (Twilight), Kirsten Dunst, Amy Adams and Viggo Mortensen.This edition is transcribed from the original manuscript: hundreds of typed pages taped together by Kerouac to form a ''scroll'', published word for word as it was originally composed.Sal Paradise (Sam Riley), a young innocent, joins his hero Dean Moriarty (Garrett Hedlund), a traveller and mystic, the living epitome of Beat, on a breathless, exuberant ride back and forth across the United States. Their hedonistic search for release or fulfilment through drink, sex, drugs and jazz becomes an exploration of personal freedom, a test of the limits of the American dream.
£10.44
