The Blithedale Romance

Nathaniel Hawthorne

A group of people is a powerful mixture of competing ambitions, and its idealism finds little satisfaction in agriculture. Instead of changing the world, Blithedale community members individually follow selfish paths that ultimately lead to tragedy. Hawthornes tale simultaneously mourns and saturates a rural idyll, not unlike the history of America in the 19th century as a whole.

The Exploits of Brigadier Gerard

Arthur Conan Doyle

The Exploits of Brigadier Gerard is a volume collecting 8 short stories about a courier and cavalryman in the personal service of Napoleon Bonaparte. The stories in The Exploits of Brigadier Gerard are all told in the first person by an aged Gerard looking back on his military endeavours in the early 1800s when there was no man prouder to serve the Emperor Napoleon. Etienne Gerard is a dashing, chivalrous, and stalwart French officer who becomes involved various suspenseful and often comical political intrigues. He battles outlaws, Englishmen and Cossacks and always maintains a his honor and his style. However, despite his ludicrous self-adoration, Gerard is a hugely likeable figure owing to the fact that he does display the commendable traits of loyalty and bravery that he cannot disguise.

The Whisperer in Darkness

H.P. Lovecraft

The Whisperer in Darkness brings together the original Cthulhu Mythos stories of the legendary horror writer H.P. Lovecraft. An Arkham university professor is contacted by a farmer living in a remote part of Vermont, who claims to have evidence of aliens living in the hills and mining a mysterious metal. When local newspapers report strange things seen floating in rivers during a historic Vermont flood, Wilmarth becomes embroiled in a controversy about the reality and significance of the sightings, though he sides with the skeptics. After visiting, the professor becomes alarmed at the mysterious change in the behavior of the farmer, including his assertion that the aliens can extract a human brain and keep it alive in jar for eternity. Wilmarth uncovers old legends about monsters living in the uninhabited hills who abduct people who venture or settle too close to their territory.

The Seed of Empire

Fred M. White

Fred M. White wrote a story on a historical basis. Belgium is just a pawn in a game of chess, in which Germany has played continuously for the last 40 years. And now England was waiting. Black Monday was overtaken. Germany violated its solemn promise to Belgium, and England was at war with Germany, and the greatest conflict in the history of the world began.

The Blanket of the Dark

John Buchan

Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown is a time-tested adage that suits Peter Pentecost, a young monk and legitimate claimant to Englands Throne. But he is not alone as others are vying for power too. Soon a plot is hatched against the present King Henry VIII and Peter is sucked into the intrigue... Buchans description of the ruthless king is compelling. His knowledge of the time of Henrys reign and his love of the Oxfordshire countryside are apparent. This historical novel set in the time of Henry VIII vividly depicting both high life and low in the society of that time. A grand, sweeping historical drama. Set in Mediaeval England during a tense time as a the country waits for the new king to be crowned. A enthralling, richly detailed story of intrigue and passion.

Seven For A Secret. A Love Story

Mary Webb

Seven For A Secret is the story of a young girl who turns into a compassionate, passionate, loving woman, who is visible through the eyes of a shepherd poet who loves her. Gillian is nineteen when the romance opens, and she is a romantic star who wants to flirt with men to fall in love with her. Gillian, in many ways, still behaves like a child, and she is selfish, narcissistic, and stupid with others in her life. A kind and simple shepherd named Robert, working with her father, often becomes the goal of her coquetry.

The House Without a Key

Earl Derr Biggers

Charlie Chan, the first Chinese detective in literature, is modeled after Chang Apana, a real-life police detective in Honolulu. A family originally from Boston, the Winterslips, has some members living in Hawaii. You can almost feel the gentle trade winds of Hawaii during the 1920s in this classic novel by Earl Derr Biggers. One of the wealthy Winterslips living in Hawaii is murdered. A younger member of the family, John Quincy Winterslip, has been sent to Boston to check up on his Aunt Minerva and persuade her to return to Boston. He arrives in Honolulu and gets involved in the investigation and is determined to see it through to the end, before he returns to the mainland. Romantic and full of atmosphere, this is a most enjoyable read that was our first introduction to Charlie Chan.

Blood of the Gods

Robert E. Howard

I have known many gods. He who denies them is as blind as he who trusts them too deeply. I seek not beyond death. It may be the blackness averred by the Nemedian skeptics, or Croms realm of ice and cloud, or the snowy plains and vaulted halls of the Nordheimers Valhalla. I know not, nor do I care. Let me live deep while I live; let me know the rich juices of red meat and stinging wine on my palate, the hot embrace of white arms, the mad exultation of battle when the blue blades flame and crimson, and I am content. Let teachers and philosophers brood over questions of reality and illusion. I know this: if life is illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I love, I slay, and am content.