Book picks similar to
Boris Pasternak: Doctor Zhivago by Angela Livingstone
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Winter's Tale
Mark Helprin - 1983
One night in winter, Peter Lake, orphan and master-mechanic, attempts to rob a fortress-like mansion on the Upper West Side.Though he thinks the house is empty, the daughter of the house is home. Thus begins the love between Peter Lake, a middle-aged Irish burglar, and Beverly Penn, a young girl, who is dying.Peter Lake, a simple, uneducated man, because of a love that, at first he does not fully understand, is driven to stop time and bring back the dead. His great struggle, in a city ever alight with its own energy and besieged by unprecedented winters, is one of the most beautiful and extraordinary stories of American literature.
The Master
Colm Tóibín - 2004
With stunningly resonant prose, “The Master is unquestionably the work of a first-rate novelist: artful, moving, and very beautiful” (The New York Times Book Review). The emotional intensity of this portrait is riveting.
The Glimpses of the Moon
Edith Wharton - 1922
They devise a shrewd bargain: they'll marry and spend a year or so sponging off their wealthy friends, honeymooning in their mansions and villas. As Susy explains, "We should really, in a way, help more than hamper each other. We both know the ropes so well; what one of us didn't see the other might - in the way of opportunities, I mean". The other part of the plan states that if either one of them meets someone who can advance them socially, they're free to dissolve the marriage. How their plan unfolds is a comedy of errors that will charm all fans of Wharton's work.
Desperate Pastors' Wives
Ginger Kolbaba - 2007
All desperate for something. Is it possible that their desperation will lead to hope? Mimi, Lisa, Jennifer, and Felicia all live in the fishbowl of Red River, Ohio. Everyone expects something from them. Gourmet casseroles. Perfect husbands. Well-behaved children. They expect even more of themselves. The constant demands and always-ringing phones are enough to drive any sane woman crazy. Add to all that the condescending Katherine Fleming Katt -- self-promoting pastor's wife of the town's largest church -- who loves to flaunt her superior position. In the midst of such chaos, will each woman find the one thing she longs for? When the unflappable Kitty Katt starts showing up at odd places, the four friends get suspicious. Is Kitty hiding something? What secrets lie behind her "perfect" exterior? But even more significant than unraveling Kitty Katt's secrets is finding answers for themselves.
The Golden Notebook
Doris Lessing - 1962
In one, with a black cover, she reviews the African experience of her earlier year. In a red one she records her political life, her disillusionment with communism. In a yellow one she writes a novel in which the heroine relives part of her own experience. And in the blue one she keeps a personal diary. Finally, in love with an American writer and threatened with insanity, Anna tries to bring the threads of all four books together in a golden notebook.
Somewhere a Band is Playing
Ray Bradbury - 2007
THE BOOK INCLUDES THE FINAL MANUSCRIPT AS WELL AS EARLY DRAFTS.
The Catcher in the Rye and J.D. Salinger
Jonathan Coupland - 2014
Explore the unique world of The Catcher in the Rye and JD Salinger
Wittgenstein's Mistress
David Markson - 1988
It is the story of a woman who is convinced, and, astonishingly, will ultimately convince the reader as well, that she is the only person left on earth. Presumably she is mad. And yet so appealing is her character, and so witty and seductive her narrative voice, that we will follow her hypnotically as she unloads the intellectual baggage of a lifetime in a series of irreverent meditations on everything and everybody from Brahms to sex to Heidegger to Helen of Troy. And as she contemplates aspects of the troubled past which have brought her to her present state, so too will her drama become one of the few certifiably original fictions of our time.
Miramont's Ghost
Elizabeth Hall - 2015
Only one person knows the truth: Adrienne Beauvier, granddaughter of the Comte de Challembelles and cousin to the man who built the castle.Clairvoyant from the time she could talk, Adrienne’s visions show her the secrets of those around her. When her visions begin to reveal dark mysteries of her own aristocratic French family, Adrienne is confronted by her formidable Aunt Marie, who is determined to keep the young woman silent at any cost. Marie wrenches Adrienne from her home in France and takes her to America, to Miramont Castle, where she keeps the girl isolated and imprisoned. Surrounded by eerie premonitions, Adrienne is locked in a life-or-death struggle to learn the truth and escape her torment.Reminiscent of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, this hauntingly atmospheric tale is inspired by historical research into the real-life Miramont Castle in Manitou Springs, Colorado.
The End of the Affair
Graham Greene - 1951
Now, a year after Sarah's death, Bendrix seeks to exorcise the persistence of his passion by retracing its course from obsessive love to love-hate. At first, he believes he hates Sarah and her husband, Henry. Yet as he delves deeper into his emotional outlook, Bendrix's hatred shifts to the God he feels has broken his life, but whose existence at last comes to recognize.
Infinite Jest
David Foster Wallace - 1996
Set in an addicts' halfway house and a tennis academy, and featuring the most endearingly screwed-up family to come along in recent fiction, Infinite Jest explores essential questions about what entertainment is and why it has come to so dominate our lives; about how our desire for entertainment affects our need to connect with other people; and about what the pleasures we choose say about who we are. Equal parts philosophical quest and screwball comedy, Infinite Jest bends every rule of fiction without sacrificing for a moment its own entertainment value. It is an exuberant, uniquely American exploration of the passions that make us human—and one of those rare books that renew the idea of what a novel can do.
Bleak House
Charles Dickens - 1853
The obscure case of Jarndyce and Jarndyce, in which an inheritance is gradually devoured by legal costs, the romance of Esther Summerson and the secrets of her origin, the sleuthing of Detective Inspector Bucket and the fate of Jo the crossing-sweeper, these are some of the lives Dickens invokes to portray London society, rich and poor, as no other novelist has done. Bleak House, in its atmosphere, symbolism and magnificent bleak comedy, is often regarded as the best of Dickens. A 'great Victorian novel', it is so inventive in its competing plots and styles that it eludes interpretation.
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime Annoying Younger Brothers (Annoying Younger Brothers Revision Series)
P.M. Cookridge - 2014
It's simple to read and simple to follow. Written by experienced English teachers who know how to deal with exams. Buy it! Follow it! Walk into the exam with confidence! A small price for big results. From the 'Annoying Younger Brothers' people.