The Diary of a Nobody is so unassuming a work that even its author, George Grossmith, seemed unaware that he had produced a masterpiece. For more than a century this wonderfully comic portrayal of suburban life and values has remined in print, a source of delight to generations of readers, and a major literary influence, much imitated but never equalled. If you don't recognise yourself at some point in The Diary you are probably less than human. If you can read it without laughing aloud you have no sense of humour.

Starred Review。 Some failures lead to phenomenal successes，and this American nurse’s unsuccessful attempt to climb K2，the world’s second tallest mountain，is one of them。Dangerously ill when he finished his climb in 1993，Mortenson was sheltered for seven weeks by the small Pakistani village of Korphe； in return， he promised to build the impoverished town’s first school， a project that grew into the Central Asia Institute， which has since constructed more than 50 schools across rural Pakistan and Afghanistan。 Coauthor Relin recounts Mortenson’s efforts in fascinating detail， presenting compelling portraits of the village elders，con artists， philanthropists，mujahideen， Taliban officials，ambitious school girls and upright Muslims Mortenson met along the way。As the book moves into the post-9/11 world， Mortenson and Relin argue that the United States must fight Islamic extremism in the region through collaborative efforts to alleviate poverty and improve access to educa

Elena Gilbert is once again at the centre of magic and dangerbeyond her imagining. And once more, Stefan isn't there to help!Elena is forced to trust her life to Damon, the handsome but deadlyvampire who wants Elena, body and soul. They must journey to theslums of the Dark Dimension, a world where vampires and demons roamfree, but humans must live as slaves of their supernatural masters.Damon's brother, the brooding vampire Stefan whom Elena loves, isimprisoned here, and Elena can only free him by finding the twohidden halves of the key to his cell. Meanwhile, the tensionbetween Elena and Damon mounts until Elena is faced with a terribledecision: which brother does she really want to be with? The drama,danger and star-crossed love that fills each Vampire Diaries bookis in full effect here, with Elena Gilbert once again filled withsupernatural powers.

‘I am writing to a rhythm and not to a plot’，Virginia Woolf stated of her eighth novel，The Waves。 Widely regarded as one of her greatest and most original works，it conveys the rhythms of life in synchrony with the cycle of nature and the passage of time。 Six children-Bernard，Susan，Rhoda，Neville，Jinny and Louis-meet in a garden close to the sea，their voices sounding over the constant echo of the waves that roll back and forth from the shore。 The subsequent continuity of these six main characters，as they develop from childhood to maturity and follow different passions and ambitions，is interspersed with interludes from the timeless and unifying chorus of nature。 In pure stream-of-consciousness style，Woolf presents a cross-section of multiple yet parallel lives，each marked by the disintegrating force of a mutual tragedy。 The Waves is her searching exploration of individual and collective identity，and the observations and emotions of life，from the simplicity and sur

The unforgettable story of Heathcliff and Catherine, whose doomed love torments them in a tempest of madness, vengeance, and redemption. EACH ENRICHED CLASSIC EDITION INCLUDES: A concise introduction that gives readers important background information A chronology of the author's life and work A timeline of significant events that provides the book's historical context An outline of key themes and plot points to help readers form their own interpretations Detailed explanatory notes Critical analysis, including contemporary and modern perspectives on the work Discussion questions to promote lively classroom and book group interaction A list of recommended related books and films to broaden the reader's experience Enriched Classics offer readers affordable editions of great works of literature enhanced by helpful notes and insightful commentary. The scholarship provided in Enriched Classics enables readers to appreciate, understand, and enjoy the world's finest books to their full pot

Written with complete access to the Queen Mother's personalletters and diaries, William Shawcross's riveting biography is thetruly definitive account of this remarkable woman, whose lifespanned the twentieth century. Elizabeth Angela Marguerite BowesLyon,the youngest daughter of the Earl of Strathmore, was born on 4August 1900. Drawing on her private correspondence and otherunpublished material from the Royal Archives, William Shawcrossvividly reveals the witty girl who endeared herself to soldiersconvalescing at Glamis in the First World War; the assured youngDuchess of York; the Queen, at last feeling able to look the EastEnd in the face at the height of the Blitz; the Queen Mother,representing the nation at home and abroad throughout her longwidowhood.

Gossip Girl is back in its 3rd installment and the gossip is hotter than ever. Its Christmas time in the prestigious Upper East Side of New York and that means midterms, presents, breakup and get togethers, and college essays. Serena and Blair are friends again, and back to their old tricks and scandals. Partie, limo rides with celebrities, and jetting off to the island of St. Barts for Christmas vacation with a bunch of friends are just some of the antics Blair and Serena are up to so they can blow off some steam after midterms. On the wild beaches of St. Barts theres plenty of scandal and backstabbing as Blair flirts with her stepbrother Aaron's drummer friend Miles while Aaron is trying to suppress his feeling for Blair himself. Meanwhile Blair is still trying to write her Yale essay, based on who else but her idol Audrey Hepburn, even though she knows she been putting it off for way too long. After a botched Yale interview, the essay is extremely important if she wants a ticket to Yale. The sophistica

Stories of famously eccentric Princetonians abound--such as that of chemist Hubert Alyea, the model for The Absent-Minded Professor, or Ralph Nader, said to have had his own key to the library as an undergraduate. Or the "Phantom of Fine Hall," a figure many students had seen shuffling around the corridors of the math and physics building wearing purple sneakers and writing numerology treatises on the blackboards. The Phantom was John Nash, one of the most brilliant mathematicians of his generation, who had spiraled into schizophrenia in the 1950s. His most important work had been in game theory, which by the 1980s was underpinning a large part of economics. When the Nobel Prize committee began debating a prize for game theory, Nash's name inevitably came up--only to be dismissed, since the prize clearly could not go to a madman. But in 1994 Nash, in remission from schizophrenia, shared the Nobel Prize in economics for work done some 45 years previously. Economist and journalist Sylvia Nasar has written

Torn between two vampire brothers Damon: determined to make Elena his, he'd kill his own brotherto possess her. Stefan: desperate for the power to destroy Damon, and protectElena, he gives in to his thirst for human blood. Elena: the girl who can have anyone finds herself in the middleof a love triangle . . . one that might turn deadly.

Harry Potter is a wizard.He is in his second year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.Little does he kmow that this year will be just as eventful as the last…… JK Rowling's second book is just as funny,frightening and unepected as her first.'The Daily Mail. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is as good as its predecessor……Hogwarts is a creation of genius.'The Times Literary Supplement.

It is among such communities as these that happiness will find her last refuge on earth..". Against this backdrop Hardy tells a vivid story of life in rural Wessex which centres on the independent and beautiful Bathsheba Everdene. She decides to manage the farm she has inherited and finds herself in a powerful position for a woman of the 1840s. But power brings tragic complications when she has to decide between three rival suitors.

In this stunning follow-up to the global phenomenon The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown demonstrates once again why he is the world’s most popular thriller writer. The Lost Symbol is a masterstroke of storytelling--a deadly race through a real-world labyrinth of codes, secrets, and unseen truths . . . all under the watchful eye of Brown’s most terrifying villain to date. Set within the hidden chambers, tunnels, and temples of Washington, D.C., The Lost Symbol accelerates through a startling landscape toward an unthinkable finale. As the story opens, Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is summoned unexpectedly to deliver an evening lecture in the U.S. Capitol Building. Within minutes of his arrival, however, the night takes a bizarre turn. A disturbing object--artfully encoded with five symbols--is discovered in the Capitol Building. Langdon recognizes the object as an ancient invitation . . . one meant to usher its recipient into a long-lost world of esoteric wisdom. When Langdon’s beloved men

The three best friends make a pact over raspberry mojitos one night this year everything is going to change. Emmy is going to find a man on every continent for some no-strings fun. Adriana vows she'll secure a five-carat Harry Winston diamond on her fourth finger. And Leigh can't think of what she needs to change - until literary bad boy Jesse Chapman starts to get under her skin.

Elena Gilbert is once again at the centre of magic and dangerbeyond her imagining. And once more, Stefan isn't there to help!Elena is forced to trust her life to Damon, the handsome but deadlyvampire who wants Elena, body and soul. They must journey to theslums of the Dark Dimension, a world where vampires and demons roamfree, but humans must live as slaves of their supernatural masters.Damon's brother, the brooding vampire Stefan whom Elena loves, isimprisoned here, and Elena can only free him by finding the twohidden halves of the key to his cell. Meanwhile, the tensionbetween Elena and Damon mounts until Elena is faced with a terribledecision: which brother does she really want to be with? The drama,danger and star-crossed love that fills each Vampire Diaries bookis in full effect here, with Elena Gilbert once again filled withsupernatural powers.

Many people among them Henry James) have considered Balzac tobe the greatest of all novelists. Eugenie Grandet, his spare,classical story of a girl whose life is blighted by her father'shysterical greed, goes a long way to justifying that opinion. Oneof the most magnificent of his tales of early nineteenth-centuryFrench provincial life, this novel is the work of a writer on whomnothing was lost, and who represents most fully the ability of thehuman animal to understand and illuminate its own condition. Translated By Ellen Marriage With An Introduction By Fredric R.Jameson Fredric R. Jameson is William A. Lane, Jr. Professor ofComparative Literature at Duke University in North Carolina. Hispublications include Sartre: The Origins of a Style, Signatures ofthe Visible, and Post-modernism, or, The Cultural Logic of LateCapitalism, with Aesthetics of the Geopolitical forthcoming. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

FBI behavioral psychologist Daniel Clark is a man on a mission. After over a year of tracking a mysterious serial killer known as Eve, he feels closer than ever to discovering the murderer's true identity when he finds Eve's latest victim still alive. In an effort to save the girl, Daniel narrowly escapes becoming another casualty on Eve's list. Despite seeing the killer with his own eyes, a gunshot wound to the head leaves him with amnesia, unable to remember any details from the incident. His drive to find the killer takes on a whole new meaning when Eve takes yet another victim, one Daniel knows all too well-his estranged wife Heather. Determined to bring her back alive, Daniel takes his obsession to a dangerous new level, even recreating his own near-death experience in attempt to recall anything from his encounter with Eve. Soon enough he finds himself fighting for Heather's life, and, in the end, his own.

The life and times of Everyone's favorite thief Filled with action, villains, and surprises, the legend lives on.Days of old bursting with pageantry, knights, and beautiful maidensreturn in a superb edition of this favorite classic story.

Marie Antoinette's enchanting Austrian childhood is no preparation for palace politics in France.When her mother sends her to marry France's future King,she's plunged into a baffling world,far from home.With gossip running rife and revolution in the air,she'll need more than grace and dignity to survive.

"Mothers and Sons" is a sensitive and beautifully writtenmeditation on the dramas surrounding this most elemental ofrelationships. Psychologically intricate and emotionally incisive,each finely wrought story teases out the delicate and difficultstrands woven between mothers and sons. This is an acute, masterfuland moving collection that confirms Toibin as a great prose stylistof our time. 'Colm Toibin is a writer of extraordinary emotionalclarity. Each of the nine stories is a snapshot of a point ofcrisis ...Toibin perfectly understands the instantaneous nature ofthe ideal short story; the sense that the pen is going straightinto a major vein. These are beautiful stories, beautifullycrafted' - Kate Saunders, "Literary Review". 'The last story inthis excellent collection is a superbly powerful tale of betrayaland desertion. Quintessential Toibin' - "Spectator". 'Moving...beautifully captured moments of longing and loss ...Toibin is asubtle, intelligent and deeply felt writer' - "Guardian" 'By turnssurpr

#1 Worldwide Bestseller—More Than 80 Million Copies Sold As millions of readers around the globe have already discovered, The Da Vinci Code is a reading experience unlike any other. Simultaneously lightning-paced, intelligent, and intricately layered with remarkable research and detail, Dan Brown's novel is a thrilling masterpiece—from its opening pages to its stunning conclusion.

Des employés de ministère étriqués, une jeunesse bruyante quedistrait le canotage sur la Seine, des petits boutiquiers qui nerêvent que pêche à la ligne, des paysans ?pres au gain de laHaute-Normandie : c'est l'univers familier de Maupassant que nousretrouvons ici dans sa diversité. Et cependant, un thème unit cescontes : la destruction de l'individu. C'est en effet la mort quir?de dans ces quatre récits de la cruauté ordinaire que Maupassantfait para?tre de 1881 à 1883. Mais cette dureté n'empêche pas lagaieté, ni que la farce se mêle au tragique. Séduisante etgrin?ante tour à tour, la réalité que mettent en scène ceshistoires de la vie quotidienne n'est donc banale qu'en apparence.L'inquiétante étrangeté n'est jamais très loin et, dans ces contessi réalistes, Maupassant nous conduit aux frontières où s'effacentles explications les plus naturelles

The author of Leviathan returns with a dazzling, picaresque,new novel in which Walter Claireborne Rawley, now an octogenarian,recounts his extraordinary vaudevillian adventures as "Walt theWonder Boy" in 1924. "One hears every page of this novel, and seesit as well".--Washington Post.