Banks learns that one of the young men he has seen occasionally about the house is about to become his son-in-law. Daughter Kay announces the engagement out of nowhere. Mrs. Banks and her sons are happy, but Mr. Banks is in a dither. The groom-to-be, Buckley Dunstan, appears on the scene and Mr. Banks realizes that the engagement is serious. Buckley and Kay don't want a "big" wedding just a simple affair with a few friends! We soon learn, however, that the "few" friends idea is out. Then trouble really begins. The guest list grows larger each day, a caterer is called in, florists, furniture movers and dressmakers take over, and the Banks household is soon caught in turmoil.

    Meanwhile, slinging drinks does have its perks: free booze, big tips, and plenty of women hitting on him constantly. He’s not looking for love, only a little fun to forget his troubles. But when he meets a mysterious beauty named Fonia, Jaguar is intrigued. Handsome and confident, Jag has never had problems attracting the opposite sex, but Fonia is elusive and presents a challenge. An old friend offers Jag an opportunity to make extra cash bartending at a private party. But the party is nothing like Jag has ever experienced. Not even the wildest frat party could compare to this extravaganza where no pleasure is forbidden. But the biggest shocker comes when Jag realizes that Fonia is heavily into bondage and submission. She belongs to a dominant master and Jag hates to watch her surrender to her deviant lover. Fonia has captured Jag’s heart, and over time he tries to convince her to break away from her brutal lover and understand that true love should never hurt.

    The story is split into parts which first explore the world from the point of view of each of these protagonists. A carefree Kalyanikutty is brought home in the middle of her exams by her widowed mother following the rumours that had been running around the town on her affair with a boy with a bad character, Prabhu. She surprises everyone with her cold attitude towards what they think is taboo in this society, she attain maturity and becomes strong enough to shock the society once again. Subha, her best friend is forced to marry the man whom she despised the most, Prabhu. She finds self-destruction as the only way to take revenge against the people who are trying to subjugate her and as a bad omen to the family it works. Prabhu, the spoilt , charming, womanizing rascal of the town completes the equation. His failure starts with Kalyanikutty, but gets the fatal blow from Subha that turns him around. His reprisal and how he finally realizes the mistakes prompts him to attempt the final act of redemption. In the depths of a canvas of very calm individuals and a modern town life this story runs as a strong undercurrent of tragedies. To all these drama only stars are the witness.

    It is a widely read piece of Gujarati literature.The supernovel was written over a period of 15 years, with the first volume being published in 1887 and the fourth one in 1902.The focus of the novel is on two Gujarati Brahmin families. The family of Lakshminandan is settled in Bombay, and is very wealthy. Saraswatichandra, the brilliant scholar-to-be, is born to Lakshminandan and Chandralakshmi. He has a dazzling career to look forward to as he is steeped in Sanskrit and English classics, is a barrister by qualification and has tried his hand successfully at his father's business. The other family is that of Vidyachatur, the highly knowledgeable prime minister of the court of King Maniraj of kingdom of Ratnanagari. To him and his wife, Gunasundari, the lady of tremendous qualities, are born two daughters, Kumudsundari (the elder) and Kusumsundari. Saraswatichandra's mother dies, and Lakshminandan remarries. The step-mother, Guman, is a scheming woman and she treats her step-son with suspicion and dislike. Meanwhile, Saraswatichandra and Kumudsundari are engaged to be married, subsequent to which they exchange letters and fall in love without having seen each other; he, charmed with Kumud's tenderness and similar likes and she, taken in by his vast knowledge and excellent qualities.Things reach a head in Saraswatichandra's home when he realizes that even his father suspects him of having an interest only in the family wealth and he decides to renounce his home. His best friend, Chandrakant, tries his best to prevent his friend from carrying out this terrible vow. But Saraswatichandra is not amenable to argument, and he leaves, thus not only renouncing home and wealth, but also leaving young Kumud in the lurch. He proceeds by sea to Suvarnapur. By the time he reaches there, Kumud has already been married off to Pramad-dhan, the wayward son of Buddhidhan, the man who is slated to become prime minister of Suvarnapur.And thus, we come to the third family. Buddhidhan is a Bania (vaaNiyaa) and has a sharp intelligence and political sense, by which he manages to overturn the reign of Suvarnapur's ruler, Jadsinh, and his administrators, Dushtrai and Shathrai. His own Rajput friend, Bhoopsinh, becomes king and Buddhidhan, his prime minister. Saraswatichandra stays at Buddhidhan's place calling himself Navinchandra, and watches all this political activity with interest. Inevitably, he comes into contact a few times with Kumud, the daughter-in-law of the house. Love for each other ignites again, and a lowly companion of the daughter of the house takes advantage of this and incites Pramad-dhan against his wife.On the day Buddhidhan gets the prime minister's post, Saraswatichandra leaves his house due to the tensions that contact with Kumud is causing them both and leaves without a destination in mind. Meanwhile, Kumud is also on her way in a palanquin and accompanied by guards, to see her mother in Manoharpuri. Saraswatichandra's is attacked by bandits and they leave him injured in a forest. An attack on Kumud is also planned by the bandits. Kumud's grandfather, Maanchatur, manage to foil the bandits' plans, capture their leader, but then, Kumud, fearing shame and infamy, jumps into the Subhadra river. Everybody assumes her dead.Saraswatichandra, meanwhile, is rescued by a group of ascetics and taken to their ashram on the nearby mountains of Sundargiri. Here, Saraswatichandra impresses the head monk, Vishnudas, by his breadth of knowledge and eventually makes him name him as his successor to the post of head monk. Kumud also survives and her unconscious body is caught by a lady ascetic, Chandraavali. This group takes Kumud to Vishnudas' ashram and both she and Saraswatichandra come to know of each other's presence there.The ashram ascetics realize the facts of the past life of these two, and try their best to reunite them. In this attempt, they take them both to an isolated cave on the peak of Chiranjeevshrung. Here, spending four days and nights together, they undergo a mystical experience and they realise their goal of life. Ratnanagari's police and detectives find out where Saraswatichandra and Kumud are, and eventually, his entire family talk to Vishnudas about getting the two 'back into the world', and convince the two about the same. However, there is no consensus on the marriage of Kumud to Saraswatichandra. Kumud on the other hand tries to convince saras to marry Kusum (kumud's sister). The story ends with Saraswatichandra marrying Kusum.This is the plot of the novel described in the briefest possible manner, without conveying even an iota of the emotions, the tension, the idealism of some characters and the pragmatism of others, the sheer vicissitudes of life in these three families after Saraswatichandra renounced home.

    Majeed's father was rich once, so could send him to a school in the distant town, although he was not very good at studies. Suhra's father on the other hand had trouble making both ends meet. Even then he wanted to send his daughter, who was good at studies to the school. But after her father's death, all her hopes of further studies was ruined. Majeed begs his father to sponsor Suhra's education, but he refuses. Majeed leaves home after a skirmish with his father, and wanders over distant lands for a long time before returning home. On his return, he finds that his family's former affluence is all gone, and that his beloved Suhra has married someone else. He is grief struck at the loss of love, and this is when Suhra turns up at his home. She is a shadow of her former self. The beautiful, sunshiny, vibrant Suhra of old is now a woman worn out by life, battered hard by a loveless marriage to an abusive husband. Majeed commands her, "Suhra, don't go back!" and she stays.

    Brought to America at the age of two. Eighteen or 20 books of prose and poetry. Bukowski, after publishing prose in Story and Portfolio stopped writing for ten years. He arrived in the charity ward of the Los Angeles County General Hospital, hemorrhaging as a climax of a ten-year drinking bout. Some say he didn't die. After leaving the hospital he got a tyewriter and began writing again - this time, poetry. He later returned to prose and gained some fame with his column, Notes of a Dirty Old Man, which he wrote mainly for the paper, Open City. After 14 years in the Post Office he resigned at age 50, he says, to keep from going insane. He now claims to be unemployable and eats typewriter ribbons. Once married, once divorced, many times shacked, he has a seven-year-old daughter.These dirty and immortal stories appeared mainly in Underground newspapers, with Open City and Nola Express leading in the publication of them. Others have appeared in Evergreen Review, Knight, Pix, Berkeley Barb, Adam, and Adam Reader.With Bukowski, the votes are still coming in. There seems to be no middle ground - people seem either to love him or hate him. Tales of his own life and doings are as wild and weird as the very stories he writes. In a sense, Bukowski is a legend in his time...a madman, a recluse, a lover...tender, vicious...never the same...these are exceptional stories that come pounding out of his violent and depraved life...horrible and holy...you cannot read them and ever come away the same again.

    Mama, a sweet and capable manager, sees her children through childhood, manages to educate them and to see one of her daughters begin her career as a writer. Mama's sisters and uncle furnish a rich background for a great deal of comedy and a little incidental tragedy, while the doings of the children manage to keep everyone in pleasant turmoil. No description can do justice to the rich characterizations that fill the author's canvas. A High School version (ISBN 0-8222-0550-5) is also available at the same price. Groups interested should specify which version."

    His friends go to Yale and Harvard. August himself has just landed a prize government job. The job takes him to Madna, “the hottest town in India,” deep in the sticks. There he finds himself surrounded by incompetents and cranks, time wasters, bureaucrats, and crazies. What to do? Get stoned, shirk work, collapse in the heat, stare at the ceiling. Dealing with the locals turns out to be a lot easier for August than living with himself. English, August is a comic masterpiece from contemporary India. Like A Confederacy of Dunces and The Catcher in the Rye, it is both an inspired and hilarious satire and a timeless story of self-discovery.

    An immediate classic, it tells the story of five Harvard men, the women they loved -- and the elegant car that came to symbolize their romantic youth. It is also the story of their coming-of-age in the dark days of World War II, and of their unshakable loyalty to a lost dream of Camelot, of grace and style, in the decades that followed. "The Last Convertible is a gripping tribute to a way of living that immortalized the "Greatest Generation."

    Choices were made without thinking. Young lives came together and would never be the same again. Years on, as Ursula confronts decisions that are not so easy to make, revelations collide with memories of Candelo - and some breathtaking secrets come to light.

    All of a sudden, she finds herself pretending—unwillingly at that—to be his girlfriend to make his ex jealous.Now, not only does she have to deal with dirty looks from the girls in school who want Kenji for themselves, but her supposed boyfriend is getting on her nerves. He's hotheaded, never seems to agree with her on anything—and everything about him screams gangster.Has Athena gotten herself into more trouble than she can handle? Or has she actually found herself a boy she can call hers—gangster be damned?

    A twelve-year-old boy writes an essay which inadvertently uncovers a secret from World War II: a secret of a boat adrift on a moonless night, and a treacherous act of kindness. His discovery unleashes a chain of events that rips a close community apart, turning neighbour against neighbour, friend against friend.The boy′s corner of the world has been spared the destruction that ravaged Europe and Asia, but beneath the surface bitter memories and old enmities run deep. The war is over but, as the boy discovers, it is far from done with.Remember Me compellingly evokes the hopes and hardships of the post-war world, and examines what can happen in a close, cosy community when the world comes knocking at the door ... and how redemption may lie in the most unlikely hands.

    It is a tale of romance and adventure in the wild, rugged Canadian wilderness. Once again, James Oliver Curwood spins a tale of adventure and romance in the Canadian wilderness with an interesting twist. In this book, the good are not so very good, and the bad becomes the hero in the end. "The Law" puts Jolly Roger McKay on the run, separating him from his love, Nada. Peter, the half Airedale, half Mackenzie hound called Pied-Bot is torn between the two and determined to protect both against all enemies, man or beast. This is a heart-rending tale of love and heroics between a man, a woman and their little dog, Peter. Sergeant Cassidy, of the Royal Northwest Mounties, chases Jolly Roger across the wilds of Northern Canada in a "fair fight" in which each takes his turn in winning over the other. With Cassidy always close behind, Jolly Roger heads for his friends of the Cree tribe. There, his dear friend, Yellowbird, predicts that he will once again see Nada in "The Country Beyond," a place as yet unknown. Tragedy and comedy avail each of the main characters in this book, Jolly Roger, Sergeant Cassidy, Nada, and even Pied-bot as the story advances to determine whether Cassidy will catch McKay before he can reach Nada and escape.

    Secretly in love with Midia, the wife of a banished revolutionary, Morn finds himself facing renewed bloodshed and disaster when Midia's husband returns, provoking a duel and the return of chaos that Morn has fought so hard to prevent.The first major work and the only play of Vladimir Nabokov, author of Lolita and Pnin, The Tragedy of Mister Morn is translated and published in English here for the first time, and is a moving study of the elusiveness of happiness, the power of imagination and the eternal battle between truth and fantasy.

    Some Will Change Your Life.While the headlines screamed “Hollywood Heartthrob Marries Girl Next Door,” the public relationship of Jack Harrington and Grace Winslowe never revealed the private struggles that threatened to pull them apart–and when celebrity biographer Jada Eastman starts digging, she discovers that there’s more to this couple than anyone could guess.Their relationship began like a scene from one of Jack’s movies. Leaving behind a dead-end relationship and the bitter Chicago winter, Grace had moved to Southern California to start a new life. Meanwhile, Jack had established himself as an up-and-comer with considerable acting talent, and a private heartache. When a fateful accident pulled the two of them together, they couldn’t avoid their initial attraction or the vast differences in their values and lifestyles.Now, against the backdrop of Beverly Hills and the 24/7 nature of the entertainment world, Jada grapples with her own beliefs as she encounters the spiritual chasm of this famous couple. Can Grace and Jack face the consequences of their own personal histories–and can the biographer avoid being affected? As the three of them examine the couple’s bittersweet story, it becomes clear that everyday decisions can carry lifetime consequences when individual worlds collide.