Robert is a difficult and disturbed young man. He turns to his Calvinist faith for solace but finds it hard to get along with other people. After he falls in with the mysterious and charming Gil-Martin, his actions become more and more extreme. He convinces himself that he is one of the chosen few and that, therefore, all his actions are right and good . . . even murder.
James Hogg ('the Ettrick Shepherd') was a poet, novelist, and farmer whose work was discovered by Sir Walter Scott and admired by writers as different as Wordsworth and Byron. His most famous book, The Confessions of a Justified Sinner (1824), is striking in its use of Calvinist doctrine, demonology, and a highly modern psychological perception to tell the story of the criminal Colwan, deluded by occult forces into thinking he represents an instrument of divine justice and vengeance.
Introduction by Roger Lewis
(Book Jacket Status: Not Jacketed) Views: 731
A satire of Victorian admiration for all things medieval, this early work by Thackeray is decidedly contrary—a self-confessed middle-aged novel that begins where most novels end: with marriage. Rebecca and Rowena calls into question the ending of Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe, exploring the miserable marriage of Sir Wilfrid to the 'icy, faultless, prim' Rowena. In an irreverent and theatrical plot, in which the dead come back to life, marriage is exposed as really quite dull, and imperialism is mocked mercilessly, Thackeray ridiculously reunites Ivanhoe with his first love, Rebecca, claiming they were wrongly separated in the earlier novel. Views: 731
“This is the original Game of Thrones.” George R.R. Martin.
Charles IV is now king of France and his sister is Edward II of England’s Queen. Having been imprisoned by Edward as leader of the rebellious English barons, Roger Mortimer escapes to France, where he joins the war against the English Aquitaine. But it is his love affair with Isabella, the ‘She-Wolf of France’, who has come seemingly to negotiate a treaty of peace that seals his fate… Views: 731
Here is Peter Benchley’s classic suspense novel of shark versus man, which was made into the blockbuster Steven Spielberg movie. The Jaws phenomenon changed popular culture and continues to inspire a growing interest in sharks and the oceans today.
When Peter Benchley wrote Jaws in the early 1970s, he meticulously researched all available data about shark behavior. Over the ensuing decades, Benchley was actively engaged with scientists and filmmakers on expeditions around the world as they expanded their knowledge of sharks. Also during this time, there was an unprecedented upswing in the number of sharks killed to make shark-fin soup, and Benchley worked with governments and nonprofits to sound the alarm for shark conservation. He encouraged each new generation of Jaws fans to enjoy his riveting tale and to channel their excitement into support and protection of these magnificent, prehistoric apex predators.
This edition of Jaws contains bonus content from Peter Benchley’s archives, including the original typed title page, a brainstorming list of possible titles, a letter from Benchley to producer David Brown with honest feedback on the movie adaptation, and excerpts from Benchley’s book Shark Trouble highlighting his firsthand account of writing Jaws, selling it to Universal Studios, and working with Steven Spielberg.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
“A tightly written, tautly paced study of terror [that] makes us tingle.”—The Washington Post
“Powerful . . . [Benchley’s] story grabs you at once.”—The New York Times Book Review
“Relentless terror . . . You’d better steel yourself for this one. It isn’t a tale for the faint of heart.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer
“Pure engrossment from the very opening . . . a fine story told with style, class, and a splendid feeling for suspense.”—Chicago Sun-Times Views: 730
Originally subtitled "An Adventurous Education, 1935-1946," Vanity of Duluoz is a key volume in Jack Kerouac's lifework, the series of autobiographical novels he referred to as The Legend of Duluoz. With the same tender humor and intoxicating wordplay he brought to his masterpieces On the Road and The Dharma Bums, Kerouac takes his alter ego from the football fields of small-town New England to the playing fields and classrooms of Horace Mann and Columbia, out to sea on a merchant freighter plying the sub-infested waters of the North Atlantic during World War II, and back to New York, where his friends are the writers who would one day become known as the Beat generation and where he published his first novel.
Written in 1967 from the vantage point of the psychedelic sixties, Vanity of Duluoz gives a fascinating portrait of the young Kerouac, dedicated and disciplined in his determination from an early age to be an important American writer. Views: 730
This book includes every story written by Doris Lessing about Africa: all of her first collection, This Was the Old Chief's Country (unavailable in America); the four tales about Africa from Five (also unavailable); the African stories from The Habit of Loving and A Man and Two Women and four stories never before collected.
This, then, is Doris Lessing's Africa - where she lived for twenty-five years and where so much of her interest and concern still resides. Here, as she sees them, are the complexities, the agonies and joys, the textures of African life and society.
The collection, bridging as it does Mrs. Lessing's entire writing career, contains much of her most extraordinary work. Beyond that, it is a brilliant portrait of a world that is vital to all of us, shadowy to most of us - perceived by an artist of the first rank writing with passion and honesty about her native land.
It is a central book in the work of one of the most important of today's writers. Views: 729
For the first time Dunnett's Lymond Chronicles are available in the United States in quality paperback editions.
Sixth in the legendary Lymond Chronicles, Checkmate takes place in 1557, where Francis Crawford of Lymond is once again in France, leading an army against England. But even as the Scots adventurer succeeds brilliantly on the battlefield, his haunted past becomes a subject of intense interest to forces on both sides. Views: 729
It's all a grand adventure when English Christy Mansel unexpectedly runs into her cousin Charles in Damascus. And being young, rich, impetuous, and used to doing whatever they please, they decide to barge in uninvited on their eccentric Great-Aunt Harriet—despite a long-standing family rule strictly forbidding unannounced visits. Because when the Gabriel hounds run howling over the crumbling palace of Der Ibrahim in the Lebanon, someone will shortly die.
A strange new world awaits Charles and Christy beyond the gates of Dar Ibrahim—"Lady Harriet's" ancient, crumbling palace in High Lebanon—where a physician is always in residence and a handful of Arab servants attends to the odd old woman's every need. But there is a very good—very sinister—reason why guests are not welcome at Dar Ibrahim. And the young cousins are about to discover that, as difficult as it is to break into the dark, imposing edifice, it may prove even harder still to escape. Views: 729
A Stranger in the Mirror is a 1976 novel written by Sidney Sheldon. The novel is one of the earliest Sheldon's works, but contains the typical Sheldon fast-paced narration and several narrative techniques with the exception of a twist ending. The novel tells the life story of two fictitious Hollywood celebrities - Toby Temple and Jill Castle, portrays the emotional extremes of success and failure and how people inevitably become victims of time. Views: 729
A P.G. Wodehouse novel
Ch�teau Blissac, on its hill above St Roque, is in a setting where every prospect pleases. But it doesn't please its current occupier, J. Wellington Gedge. Mr Gedge wants none of it - and particularly none of the domineering Mrs Gedge's imperious wish that he should become American Ambassador to Paris. Instead he pines for the simpler life of California, where men are men and filling stations stand tall.
Mrs Gedge has powerful allies - including the prohibitionist Senator Opal. But will she get her way? And will the Senator's delightful daughter Jane get her man?
In a plot which involves safe-blowers, con men, jewel-thieves and even a Bloomsbury novelist, few are quite as they seem. But the heady atmosphere of France in the 1930s makes for one of Wodehouse's most delightful comedies. Views: 729
There seemed nothing strange about Luke to begin with, except perhaps the snakes. If they were snakes - David wasn't sure. He was just grateful for a companion as agreeable as Luke, who seemed able to twist anyone round his finger, even David's odious relatives. "Just kindle a flame and I'll be with you," Luke said, and he always was - which turned out to be more awkward than useful in the end. For who were the people who seemed to be looking for Luke: the man with one eye; the massive, malevolent gardener, Mr.Chew; the offensively sprightly Frys; the man with ginger hair? Why were there ravens watching, one in front and one at the back gate? And then of course there was the fire... Views: 728
On the eve of the Cuban Missile Crisis, American and French intelligence agents are plunged into a maze of Cold War intrigue In Paris, 1962, French intelligence chief André Devereaux and NATO intelligence chief Michael Nordstrom have uncovered Soviet plans to ship nuclear arms to Cuba. But when Devereaux reports his findings and nobody acts—and he is targeted in an assassination attempt—he soon realizes he’s tangled in a plot far greater than he first understood. Views: 728
Sharp-eyed Marianne lives in a white tower made of steel and concrete with her father and the other Professors. Outside, where the land is thickly wooded and wild beasts roam, live the Barbarians, who raid and pillage in order to survive. Marianne is strictly forbidden to leave her civilized world but, fascinated by these savage outsiders, decides to escape. There, beyond the wire fences, she will discover a decaying paradise, encounter the tattooed Barbarian boy Jewel and go beyond the darkest limits of her imagination.
Playful, sensuous, violent and gripping, Heroes and Villains is an ambiguous and deliriously rich blend of post-apocalyptic fiction, gothic fantasy, literary allusion and twisted romance. Views: 728
A The Day It Rained Forever (1959) is a collection of short stories by Ray Bradbury. It was previously released in the US as Medicine for Melancholy with a slightly different list of stories.
"The Day It Rained Forever"
"In a Season of Calm Weather"
"The Dragon"
"The End of the Beginning"
"The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit"
"Fever Dream"
"Referent"
"The Marriage Mender"
"The Town Where No One Got Off"
"Icarus Montgolfier Wright"
"Almost at the End of the World"
"Dark They were and Golden-eyed"
"The Smile"
"Here there be Tygers"
"The Headpiece"
"Perchance to Dream"
"The Time of Going Away"
"The Gift"
"The Little Mice"
"The Sunset Harp"
"A Scent of Sarsaparilla"
"And the Rock Cried Out"
"The Strawberry Window" Views: 727
