Out O Luck. Biltmore Oswald Very Much at Sea

Thorne Smith

James Thorne Smith, Jr. was an American writer of humorous supernatural fantasy fiction under the byline Thorne Smith. He is best known today for the two Topper novels, comic fantasy fiction involving sex, much drinking and supernatural transformations. Smiths literary debut was Biltmore Oswald (1918), the comic fictional diary of a hapless naval recruit, drawing heavily on wartime experience with the Navy. Episodes had featured in Broadside. The book sold well enough to allow the appearance of a sequel, Out o Luck (1919). The book continues hapless sailor Oswalds exploits in diary form throughout 1918 and the armistice and up to his eventual demobilization. Many of the entries have little or nothing to do with navy life and some of the best could easily stand alone as short stories, the best of which has Oswald looking for a bath and ending up in a duel.

The Reef

Edith Wharton

This is Whartons fifth novel. It is considered, together with the previous Ethan Frome and the subsequent The Custom of the Country, as partly autobiographical. Young diplomat George Darrow is on his way to meet Anna Leath, an old girlfriend who is now a widow with a young daughter and a grown stepson. When Anna abruptly postpones their rendezvous without explanation, Darrow concludes that she is no longer interested in him. He has a brief liaison with the delicate, generous Sophy Viner, a kind woman of the working class. Unfortunately, the lives of Darrow, Anna, Sophy and Annas stepson Owen become linked and the extremely discreet sexual relationship between Darrow and Sophy complicates their lives. Whartons talent for balancing emotional turmoil and all the social manners of her time is blended into this philosophical work that explores the metaphorical reefs in the hearts of women.

The Mystery Girl

Carolyn Wells

The cozy college town of Corinth, New England is the setting for this classic locked-room mystery by Carolyn Wells, author of The Clue. In the middle of the election of a new president of the University the favorite candidate is found dead. Is it murder or suicide? All entrances to the study where the body was found were locked from the inside. The future college president and groom-to-be had no known cause for suicide, yet no clues in either direction appeared to make any sense. Its up to Detective Fleming Stone and his remarkable ingenuity to decipher the storys twin puzzles; the mystery of the locked-room death and the true nature of... The Mystery Girl. One of Carolyn Wells most well-known novels, The Mystery Girl is an enjoyable, intriguing read that will surely leave you glad for having picked it up.

Listy perskie

Monteskiusz

Wydana anonimowo powieść wybitnego myśliciela Monteskiusza. Składa się na nią 161 listów pisanych przez dwóch perskich podróżników przemierzających Europę, którzy w listach dzielą się swoimi wrażeniami i doświadczeniami z pobytu na Starym Kontynencie. Ich opisy trafnie podsumowują kondycję europejskiego społeczeństwa XVIII wieku, zadziwiająco podobną do współczesnej...

Notes from the Underground

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky

A predecessor to such monumental works such as Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov, Notes From Underground represents a turning point in Dostoyevskys writing towards the more political side. In this work, we follow the unnamed narrator of the story, who, disillusioned by the oppression and corruption of the society in which he lives, withdraws from that society into the underground. This story is an exposé of the irrational forces which underlie all human enterprises, however lofty. Yet even in the darkest moments Dostoevsky finds not only grim humor but also the possibility of redemptive love, embodied in suffering individuals and, above all, in the character of Liza. The books extraordinary style brilliantly violating literary conventions in ways never before attempted shocked its first readers and still shocks many readers today.

Crime and Punishment

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky

Is murder is permissible in pursuit of a higher purpose? Meet Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov, a destitute and desperate former student in St. Petersburg who formulates and executes a plan to kill an unscrupulous pawnbroker for her cash. Raskolnikov convinces himself that his motive for the murder is to benefit mankind. His struggle with himself and those around him becomes a battle of the individual against society, radicalism against tradition, and ultimately the will of man against the mysteries of divine providence. So begins one of the greatest novels ever written, a journey into the criminal mind, a police thriller, and a philosophical meditation on morality and redemption. The best known of Dostoevskys masterpieces, Crime and Punishment can bear any amount of rereading without losing a drop of its power over our imaginations.

Nena Sahib

John Retcliffe

Sir John Retcliffe, eigentlich Hermann Ottomar Friedrich Goedsche (1815-1878), war ein deutscher Schriftsteller. Er benutzte auch das Pseudonym Theodor Armin. Die Historisch-politischen Romane aus der Gegenwart von Sir John Retcliffe sind mit Abenteuern angereicherte Tendenzromane, die das gesamte politische Geschehen seiner Zeit zum Inhalt haben. Der indische Aufstand war ein Medienereignis, über das 1857 weltweit berichtet wurde. Indien wird einerseits als tropisches Paradies, andererseits als ein höllischer Ort blutrünstiger Menschenopfer dargestellt. Zum Rückfall Nena Sahibs kommt es, als ein britischer Major seine Frau vergewaltigt. Er wird der Agent der Vergeltung, indem er eine Mörderbande in den Kampf gegen die Kolonialherren führt. Retcliffes Roman orientalisiert die Rebellen zu unbeherrschten Gewalttätern, deren angeblich essenziell rachsüchtige und sadistische Natur in der Revolte durchbricht. Nena Sahib mutiert zum radikalen Terroristen, der antikoloniale Aufstand wird auf einen Ausbruch der wilden Natur gegen die Zivilisation reduziert.

The Slave of Silence

Fred M. White

It is difficult to make a choice and make the right choice. Our hero was in such a situation. Helpless businessman forced to sell his daughter to marry. Though his daughter is against this idea, because she does not like her husband at all. But she must for the sake of her father and his money. Will she be in such slavery all her life?