The island is nearly deserted, haunting, beautiful. Across a slip of ocean lies South Carolina. But for the handful of families on Yamacraw Island, America is a world away. For years the people here lived proudly from the sea, but now its waters are not safe. Waste from industry threatens their very existence–unless, somehow, they can learn a new life. But they will learn nothing without someone to teach them, and their school has no teacher.
Here is PAT CONROY’S extraordinary drama based on his own experience–the true story of a man who gave a year of his life to an island and the new life its people gave him. Views: 691
When Adela Quested and her elderly companion Mrs Moore arrive in the Indian town of Chandrapore, they quickly feel trapped by its insular and prejudiced 'Anglo-Indian' community. Determined to escape the parochial English enclave and explore the 'real India', they seek the guidance of the charming and mercurial Dr Aziz, a cultivated Indian Muslim. But a mysterious incident occurs while they are exploring the Marabar caves with Aziz, and the well-respected doctor soon finds himself at the centre of a scandal that rouses violent passions among both the British and their Indian subjects. A masterly portrait of a society in the grip of imperialism, A Passage to India compellingly depicts the fate of individuals caught between the great political and cultural conflicts of the modern world.
In his introduction, Pankaj Mishra outlines Forster's complex engagement with Indian society and culture. This edition reproduces the Abinger text and notes, and also includes four of Forster's essays on India, a chronology and further reading. Views: 690
First published in Redbook in 1975 to enormous acclaim, this O. Henry Award winner sold 100,000 copies in paperback. Swimmer in the Secret Sea is the poignant story of how a man and a woman endured the shock and anguish of their newborn baby's death. Views: 690
Ariadne Oliver, Queen of Crime Fiction, has been asked to devise a "Murder Hunt" for a fête at Nasse House, the home of Sir George Stubbs. But she begins to suspect that someone is manipulating the scenario of her game and fears that something very sinister is being planned.
She sends for her old friend Hercule Poirot. At first he is not inclined to take her very seriously but soon a series of events propels him to change his mind.
Then suddenly all Ariadne's worst fears are realised when the girl playing the part of the murder victim is found strangled in the boat-house. For Hercule Poirot, the Murder Hunt has become a grim reality.
A BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation starring John Moffatt as the great Belgian detective, with Julia McKenzie as Ariadne Oliver. Views: 690
The book opens in a café in Piraeus, just before dawn on a gusty autumn morning in the 1930s. The narrator, a young Greek intellectual, resolves to set aside his books for a few months after being stung by the parting words of a friend, Stavridakis, who has left for the Russian Caucasus in order to help some Pontic Greeks (in that region often referred to as Caucasus Greeks) who are being persecuted. He sets off for Crete in order to re-open a disused lignite mine and immerse himself in the world of peasants and working-class people.He is about to begin reading his copy of Dante's Divine Comedy when he feels he is being watched; he turns around and sees a man of around sixty peering at him through the glass door. The man enters and immediately approaches him to ask for work. He claims expertise as a chef, a miner, and player of the santuri, or cimbalom, and introduces himself as Alexis Zorba, a Greek born inRomania. The narrator is fascinated by Zorba's lascivious opinions and expressive manner and decides to employ him as a foreman. On their way to Crete, they talk on a great number of subjects, and Zorba's soliloquies set the tone for a large part of the book.On arrival, they reject the hospitality of Anagnostis and Kondomanolious the café-owner, and on Zorba's suggestion make their way to Madame Hortense's hotel, which is nothing more than a row of old bathing-huts. They are forced by circumstances to share a bathing-hut. The narrator spends Sunday roaming the island, the landscape of which reminds him of "good prose, carefully ordered, sober… powerful and restrained" and reads Dante. On returning to the hotel for dinner, the pair invite Madame Hortense to their table and get her to talk about her past as a courtesan. Zorba gives her the pet-name "Bouboulina" and, with the help of his cimbalom, seduces her. The protagonist seethes in his room while listening to the sounds of their impassioned lovemaking.The next day, the mine opens and work begins. The narrator, who has socialist ideals, attempts to get to know the workers, but Zorba warns him to keep his distance: "Man is a brute.... If you're cruel to him, he respects and fears you. If you're kind to him, he plucks your eyes out." Zorba himself plunges into the work, which is characteristic of his overall attitude, which is one of being absorbed in whatever one is doing or whomever one is with at that moment. Quite frequently Zorba works long hours and requests not to be interrupted while working. The narrator and Zorba have a great many lengthy conversations, about a variety of things, from life to religion, each other's past and how they came to be where they are now, and the narrator learns a great deal about humanity from Zorba that he otherwise had not gleaned from his life of books and paper.The narrator absorbs a new zest for life from his experiences with Zorba and the other people around him, but reversal and tragedy mark his stay on Crete, and, alienated by their harshness and amorality, he eventually returns to the mainland once his and Zorba's ventures are completely financially spent. Having overcome one of his own demons (such as his internal "no," which the narrator equates with the Buddha, whose teachings he has been studying and about whom he has been writing for much of the narrative, and who he also equates with "the void") and having a sense that he is needed elsewhere (near the end of the novel, the narrator has a premonition of the death of his old friend Stavridakis, which plays a role in the timing of his departure to the mainland), the narrator takes his leave of Zorba for the mainland, which, despite the lack of any major outward burst of emotionality, is significantly emotionally wrenching for both Zorba and the narrator. It almost goes without saying that the two (the narrator and Zorba) will remember each other for the duration of their natural lives. Views: 690
Previously published in the print anthology Parker Pine Investigates.Daphne St. John enlists Parker Pyne's aid. She must return a valuable diamond she stole to pay off gambling debts. Now, repenting her rash act, Daphne needs help to return the diamond without its owner being any the wiser. Views: 690
A lonely wanderer... A magical island... And Two People Bewitched By Love....
The Channel Islands were divided in allegiance between France and England. Of French blood, and yet subjects of Queen Victoria, the islanders were curious hybrid creatures. But now, in 1888, England is slowly stretching out her arms to them.
Colin du Frocq is eight years old, and his dreams are of the sea that surrounds his home. By day he steals away and takes to the sea in any boat that is sailing. At night he lies in bed listening to the waves beating against the shore. Then one night, in a wild storm, a ship drives onto the nearby cliffs and a strange man enters Colin's life, changing Colin's course forever.
A twist of fate brought Ranulph back to a springtime place that had forgotten him. A proud and beautiful woman offered him refuge, even though she did not understand why, as she trembled before his gaze.
Now Ranulph could feel the spell of the Island twisting around him, binding him to the world of love and companionship he had rejected forever.
A storm-wracked sea had brought him home. It was the magnificent fury of another storm that taught him the splendor of life and the power of love. Views: 690
Golden girl: that was Amanda. Born into luxury, she was pampered, adored, spoiled, and very beautiful. She could have had any man she wanted. Millionaire Tom Merrill had been in love with her for years. But she chose Dart, tall, handsome, mining engineer. He was half-Indian, proud, and very poor.
Amanda had no idea what to expect as Dart's wife, an eastern stranger in the bleak little town of Lodestone, Arizona. But she found out soon enough. The people in the town hated her. And she hated the mines.
Then one day Amanda saw a chance to get away from all this - a chance to become rich beyond her dreams. The promise of gold which had driven many to madness now enslaved her. And she was willing to risk her life - and Dart's - to gain it.
(from the back cover of the 1976 Fawcett edition) Views: 690
Immortality is just a dream, but with the Scheffing process, the extremely wealthy can purchase the next best thing. For an exorbitant fee, the Scheffing Institute will make a copy of your mind's persona, hold it in storage until death, then transplant it into sublayers of the brain of a willing--& paying--host. The result for the host is immediate access to the persona's memories, knowledge, experiences & judgment. For the persona, it means full consciousness & thought-communication with the host, but without physical control of the host's body. When this futuristic tale unfolds, the brilliant, powerful multi-billionaire Paul Kaufmann has been dead for months. Institute administrator Francesco Santoliquido must make the decision of assigning Kaufmann's persona to a compatible host. With a personality as strong as Kaufmann, Santoliquido must be wary of the chance that the persona could take over the host's body--known as "going dybbuk." The only two men strong enough to control Kaufmann's persona are the ones who could benefit from it the most: Paul's nephew & current executor of the Kaufmann empire, Mark Kaufmann--& Mark's primary business rival, John Roditis of Roditis Securities. A secret struggle for possession of Kaufmann's persona takes an unexpected turn when Mark's 16-year-old daughter Risa gets involved. Views: 690
On a cruiseship bound for Buenos Aires, a wealthy passenger challenges the world chess champion to a match. He accepts with a sneer. He will beat anyone, he says. But only if the stakes are high. Soon, the chess board is surrounded. At first, the challenger crumbles before the mind of the master. But then, a soft-spoken voice from the crowd begins to whisper nervous suggestions. Perfect moves, brilliant predictions. The speaker has not played a game for more than twenty years, he says. He is wholly unknown. But somehow, he is also entirely formidable… Views: 689
Warnings not to go to Scotland can't stop Nancy Drew from setting out on a thrill-packed mystery adventure. Undaunted by the vicious threats, the attractive young detective - with her father and her two close friends - goes to visit her great-grandmother at an imposing estate in the Scottish Highlands, and to solve the mystery of a missing family heirloom.And there is another mystery to be solved: the fate of flocks of stolen sheep.Baffling clues challenge Nancy's powers of deduction: a note written in the ancient Gaelic language, a deserted houseboat on Loch Lomond, a sinister red-bearded stranger in Edinburgh, eerie whistling noises in the Highlands. Startling discoveries in an old castle and in the ruins of a prehistoric fortress, on a rugged mountain slope and in a secluded glen, lead Nancy closer to finding solutions to both mysteries.Wearing a time-honored tartan, Nancy climbs the mountain of Ben Nevis in the dark of night and plays a tune of historic heroism on the bagpipes -all part of her daring plan to trap the sheep thieves and to recover the valuable heirloom. Views: 689
SUMMARY:
In his first published play, Kurt Vonnegut finds a powerful vehicle for his tragicomical imagination. When the great hunter Harold Ryan--missing and presumed dead--returns from Africa after eight years, his wife is aghast and his son is enchanted. Vonnegut's attack on phony heroes and male swagger uses some of the funniest dialogue ever created for the stage. Views: 689
It is a time of rejoicing at Homeward, the Labyrinthine castle-city that is as magical as Oz and as full of wonders as Willy Wonka's chocolate factory. Uncle, the wise, kind, generous, and fabulously rich elephant who rules over Homeward, has joined with his many friends to celebrate their triumph over the ruffians in neighbouring Badfort.Still, there's plenty of cleaning up to do in Homeward: the waterworks are tainted with vinegar, housing is scarce, and the Dwarftown Railway is terribly overcrowded - meanwhile the Badfort crowd has devised its most diabolical plan yet. Uncle will need all the help he can get from his faithful assistant Old Monkey and from Goodman the literate cat-and possibly a wizard's spell - to get through this mess. Views: 688
Sam the Owl and Gus the Firefly literally light up the sky in this classic Beginner Book edited by Dr. Seuss. In Sam and the Firefly, P. D. Eastman (author of Are You My Mother? and Go, Dog. Go!) introduces us to the dynamic duo of Sam and Gus, who soar through the air writing words in the night sky. But when Gus’s words end up causing confusion and chaos for the people on the ground, it’s up to Sam to help Gus “write” his wrongs.
Originally created by Dr. Seuss, Beginner Books encourage children to read all by themselves, with simple words and illustrations that give clues to their meaning.
"...provides interest, suspense and word repetition. Illustrations excellent. Recommended."--(starred) *School Library Journal. *
From the Hardcover edition. Views: 688
