Book picks similar to
Angle of Repose, The Spectator Bird, Crossing to Safety by Wallace Stegner
fiction
classics
pulitzer-prize
in-library
The Innkeeper's Song
Peter S. Beagle - 1993
It is a search that will lead him into a world of magic and mystery beyond his comprehension, for his wild ride sets him on the trail of three women who are blessed—or cursed—to undertake an impossible mission of their own.Each of the three has secrets—from the world, from the two others, from herself. Each is followed by demons she can never escape. And all their destinies will be irrevocably linked in a far distant inn, when hunted and hunters finally meet. Karsh, the innkeeper, has no choice but to let the tangled drama unfold beneath his roof; his stable boy, Rosseth, is so mesmerized by the three cloaked women that he is soon finds a way to uncover what is perhaps their deepest secret; and Tikat continues his journey, refusing to let death bring an end to his love.But it is not until the once-powerful man who has called the three women joins their number that the true quest will begin. And this is a challenge that may claim all their lives before they are done. For he who has been their mentor in the past, he who has been the greatest of wizards, lingers now at the very edge of death. And only they can save him from the enemy who has brought this doom upon him, an enemy who is heir to all the ailing man’s magic, an enemy whom even Death has not been able to defeat…
The Boy Vanishes
Jennifer Haigh - 2012
Taut and powerful, it is a keen reimagining of a whodunit in which everyone is implicated and no one is safe. It’s the summer of 1976 on the South Shore of Massachusetts. The Bicentennial is a season-long celebration, and flags are everywhere, snapping in the seaside winds, ironed onto T-shirts, tattooed into biceps. Tim O’Connor works the Cigarette Game booth at Funland—toss a quarter placed on an eight-sided ball into the right slot and you win two packs of smokes or maybe, if you’re lucky, a carton. If asked his age, he’d say he’s seventeen, but in truth he’s fourteen. Yet the kids in blue-collar Grantham—a town first imagined by Haigh in her devastating bestseller "Faith"—grow up fast, are known for being wild, and more often than not drop out of school to punch the clock at the nearby Raytheon plant. When Tim disappears after the park’s closing one night, no one makes much of it till late morning. It’s not the first time his mother, Kay, has forgotten to pick him up. It’s not the first time he has stayed out all night. By the time local cops begin their investigation, there is little trace of the boy, only witnesses to a complicated set of relationships in a place where surviving isn’t always thriving and where disappointment mixes with the salt in the air. In this superbly crafted story, the search for a missing boy becomes a search for the American dream, laying bare how destructive its promises often are. Recalling Dennis Lehane in setting and subject and masters like Graham Greene and Richard Ford in tone and style, Haigh’s latest work is a testament to all that short fiction can be. It’s a searing portrait of how much a community loses when one of its own is lost.
Scorpion Trail
Geoffrey Archer - 1995
Though he is an aid worker, the secret service minders who have protected him for twenty years have reactivated him: they want information about the man who perpetrated a massacre in a Muslim village in Bosnia. His target is the most ruthless killer in the whole war zone: Milan Pravic, codename the Scorpion. And the only eyewitness to the massacre is a twelve-year-old girl whom Pravic will do anything to silence-
Clothes for a Summer Hotel
Tennessee Williams - 1981
Here Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, often seen as symbols of the doomed youth of the jazz age, become two halves of s single creative psyche, each part alternately feeding and then devouring the other.Set in Highland Hospital near Asheville, North Carolina, where Zelda spent her last confinement, this “ghost play” begins several years after Scott’s death of a heart attack in California. But the past is “still always present” in Zelda, and Williams’s constant shifting of chronology and mixing of remembrance with ghostly re-enactment suggest that our real intimacy is with the shadow characters of our own minds. As Williams said the Author’s Note to the Broadway production: “Our reason for taking extraordinary license with time and place is that in an asylum and on its grounds liberties of this kind are quite prevalent: and also these liberties allow us to explore in more depth what we believe is truth of character."Williams poses the inevitable, unanswerable questions: Did Scott prevent Zelda from achieving an independent creativity? Did Zelda’s demands force Scott to squander his talents and turn to alcohol? Whose betrayal — emotional, creative, sexual — destroyed the other? But he poses these questions in a new way: in the act of creation, Zelda and Scott are now aware of their eventual destruction, and the creative fire that consumed the two artists combines symbolically with the fire that ended Zelda’s life.
From the Earth to the Moon and 'Round the Moon
Jules Verne - 1869
showed that the projectile has passed the atmospheric strata, for the diffused light spread in the air would have been reflected on the metal walls, which reflection was wanting. This light would have lit the window, and the window was dark. Doubt was no longer possible; the travelers had left the earth. "I have lost," said Nicholl. "I congratulate you," replied Ardan. "Here are the nine thousand dollars," said the captain, drawing a roll of paper dollars from his pocket. "Will you have a receipt for it?" asked Barbicane, taking the sum. "If you do not mind," answered Nicholl; "it is more business-like." This is the legendary novel of technological speculation and social satire that launched an entire genre of adventure fiction: Verne's From the Earth to the Moon and 'Round the Moon is the first story of space exploration and remains a beloved work of daring exploits-and surprisingly accurate scientific conjecture. When the members of the Baltimore Gun Club-bored Civil War veterans-decide to fill their time by embarking on a project to shoot themselves to the moon, the race is on to raise money, overcome engineering challenges, and convince detractors that they're anything but "Lunatics." With this work, Verne inspired the first science fiction film, 1902's Le Voyage dans la lune, and accurately predicted that that ideal location for a spacebase is in Florida. First published in France in 1865, this replica 1918 edition includes the sequel, 1870's Round the Moon. Also available from Cosimo Classics: Verne's Five Weeks in a Balloon OF INTEREST TO: science fiction fans, readers of 19th-century literature French author JULES GABRIEL VERNE (1828-1905) is considered the father of modern science fiction. Among his many groundbreaking books are Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864), 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1870), and Around the World in Eighty Days (1872).
Thomas Hardy: 25 Novels - Far From The Madding Crowd, The Return of the Native, The Mayor of Casterbridge, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, Jude the Obscure and much more..
Thomas Hardy - 2015
In this ultimate collection you will find 25 works by the amazing Victorian novelist- Thomas Hardy! All in one elegantly formatted Book for ease of use and enjoyment on your Kindle device works include : 13 Novels • FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD • THE RETURN OF THE NATIVE • THE MAYOR OF CASTERBRIDGE • TESS OF THE D'URBERVILLES • JUDE THE OBSCURE • DESPERATE REMEDIES • A PAIR OF BLUE EYES • UNDER THE GREENWOOD TREE • THE WOODLANDERS • A LAODICEAN: A STORY OF TO-DAY • THE TRUMPET-MAJOR JOHN LOVEDAY • THE HAND OF ETHELBERTA • TWO ON A TOWER A dozen minor novels • A CHANGED MAN AND OTHER TALES ++ also a little bonus a Thomas Hardy Biography with links for further reading enjoy !!
Will o' the Mill
Robert Louis Stevenson - 1878
Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson (13 November 1850 - 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist, and travel writer. His most famous works are Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. A literary celebrity during his lifetime, Stevenson now ranks among the 26 most translated authors in the world. His works have been admired by many other writers, including Jorge Luis Borges, Bertolt Brecht, Arthur Conan Doyle, Cesare Pavese, Ernest Hemingway, Rudyard Kipling, Jack London, Vladimir Nabokov, J. M. Barrie, and G. K. Chesterton, who said of him that he "seemed to pick the right word up on the point of his pen, like a man playing spillikins.
The Good Earth
Pearl S. Buck - 1931
The humble Wang Lung glories in the soil he works, nurturing the land as it nurtures him and his family. Nearby, the nobles of the House of Hwang consider themselves above the land and its workers; but they will soon meet their own downfall.Hard times come upon Wang Lung and his family when flood and drought force them to seek work in the city. The working people riot, breaking into the homes of the rich and forcing them to flee. When Wang Lung shows mercy to one noble and is rewarded, he begins to rise in the world, even as the House of Hwang falls.
Selected Tales
Edgar Allan Poe - 1849
Dupin he invented the detective story; and tales such as 'MS. Found in a Bottle' and 'Von Kempelen and His Discovery' pioneered modern science-fiction.As readers will discover, Poe possessed an unrivalled capacity to create atmosphere and suspense, and to probe the dark depths of the human psyche. All the stories in this volume push back the boundaries, making the improbable possible, the familiar terrifying and strange.Contents:9 • Introduction (Selected Tales) • essay by John Curtis19 • The Duc de L'Omelette • [Tales of the Folio Club] • (1832) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe (variant of The Duke de L'Omelette)23 • MS. Found in a Bottle • [Tales of the Folio Club] • (1833) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe35 • The Assignation • [Tales of the Folio Club] • (1834) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe (variant of The Visionary)48 • Ligeia • (1838) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe65 • How to Write a Blackwood Article • (1838) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe (variant of The Psyche Zenobia)76 • The Fall of the House of Usher • (1839) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe96 • William Wilson • (1839) • novelette by Edgar Allan Poe (variant of William Wilson: A Tale)118 • The Murders in the Rue Morgue • [Chevalier Dupin] • (1841) • novelette by Edgar Allan Poe154 • A Descent into the Maelström • (1841) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe172 • The Island of the Fay • (1841) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe178 • The Colloquy of Monos and Una • (1841) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe188 • The Oval Portrait • (1842) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe192 • The Masque of the Red Death • (1842) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe (variant of The Mask of the Red Death)199 • The Mystery of Marie Rogêt • [Chevalier Dupin] • (1842) • novella by Edgar Allan Poe251 • The Pit and the Pendulum • (1842) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe267 • The Tell-Tale Heart • (1843) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe273 • The Gold-Bug • (1843) • novelette by Edgar Allan Poe311 • The Black Cat • (1843) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe322 • The Premature Burial • (1844) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe337 • The Purloined Letter • [Chevalier Dupin] • (1844) • novelette by Edgar Allan Poe357 • The Imp of the Perverse • (1845) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe364 • The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar • (1845) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe374 • The Cask of Amontillado • [Fortunado] • (1846) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe382 • The Domain of Arnheim • (1842) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe (variant of The Landscape-Garden)399 • Von Kempelen and His Discovery • (1849) • shortstory by Edgar Allan Poe
The Little Prince and Other Stories
Wordsworth ClassicsE. Nesbit - 2010
This much loved story is joined by the following classic titles, to give a collection that has something for everyone, whatever their age: Black Beauty, Little Women, Alice in Wonderland, The Secret Garden, Robin Hood, The Wind in the Willows, The Railway Children, The Jungle Book and Peter Pan.
If on a Winters Night a Traveler / Invisible Cities / The Baron in the Trees
Italo Calvino - 1979
3 TRADE SIZE BOOKS, IN A BOXED SET
The William Kent Krueger Collection #4: Vermilion Drift, Northwest Angle, and Trickster's Point
William Kent Krueger - 2015
Five are connected to a series of old unsolved disappearances. But the sixth is fresh. What’s worse, two of the victims—including the most recent—were killed with Cork’s gun. As Cork searches for answers, he must dig into his own past and that of his father, a well-respected man who harbored a ghastly truth. Northwest Angle: Amid the wreckage of a violent storm, Cork O’Connor and his daughter Jenny discover a body. Nearby, a baby boy lies hungry and dehydrated but still very much alive. Powerful forces in pursuit of the child follow them to the isolated Northwest Angle, where it’s impossible to tell who is friend or foe. Trickster’s Point: Cork O’Connor sits deep in the wilderness with his good friend Jubal Little—favored to become Minnesota’s first Native American elected governor—who is slowly dying with an arrow through his heart. But this is no hunting accident. The arrow is one of Cork’s. As he works to clear his name and track the killer who set him up, only Cork knows that his complex, passionate, ambitious friend was also capable of murder.