Oscar Wilde took London by storm with his first comedy，Lady Windermere's Fan。 The combination of dazzling wit，subtle social criticism，sumptuous settings and the theme of a guilty secret proved a winner，both here and in his next three plays，A Woman of No Importance，An Ideal Husband，and his undisputed masterpiece，The Importance of Being Earnest。 This volume includes all Wilde’s plays from his early tragedy Vera to the controversial Salome and the little known fragments，La Sainte Courtisane and A Florentine Tragedy。 The edition affords a rare chance to see Wilde's best known work in the context of his entire dramatic output，and to appreciate plays which have hitherto received scant critical attention。 Wilde's palys have never failde to delight andindces adn are a lasting testimony to their author's supreme wit and therrical genius。
Pride and Prejudice, which opens with one of the most famous sentences in English Literature, is an ironic novel of manners. In it the garrulous and empty-headed Mrs Bennet has only one aim - that of finding a good match for each of her five daughters. In this she is mocked by her cynical and indolent husband. With its wit, its social precision and, above all, its irresistible heroine, Pride and Prejudice has proved one of the most enduringly popular novels in the English language.
Book De*ion Let number-one New York Times bestselling author Nora Roberts flyyou into Lunacy, Alaska, and into a colorful, compelling new novelabout two lonely souls who find love - and redemtion... Lunacy was Nate Burke's last chance. As a Baltimore cop, he'dwatched his partner die on the street - and the guilt still hauntshim. With nowhere else to go, he accepts the job as chief of policein this tiny, remote Alaskan town, where the peace provides a balmfor his shattered soul - and an unexpected affair with pilot MegGalloway warms his nights... But other things in Lunacy are heating up. Nate suspects thekiller in an unsolved murder still walks the snowy streets. Hisinvestigation will unearth the secrets and suspicions that lurkbeneath the placid surface, as well as bring out the big-citysurvival instincts that made him a cop in the first place. And hisdiscovery will threaten the new life - and the new love - that hehas finally found for herself. "Roberts is among the best popul
The bestselling author of "When The Bough Breaks," "BloodTest," and "Over The Edge" delivers the most stunning novel yet andfeaturing psychologist-detective Dr. Alex Delaware. At a party fora controversial Los Angeles sex therapist, Alex encounters a facefrom his own past--Sharon Ransom, an exquisite, alluring lover wholeft him abruptly more than a decade earlier. Sharon now hints thathe desperately needs help, but Alex evades her. The next day she isdead, an apparent suicide. Driven by guilt and sadness, Alexplunges into the maze of Sharon's life--a journey that will takehim through the pleasure palaces of California's ultra-rich, intothe dark closets of a family's disturbing past, and finally intothe alleyways of the mind, where childhood terrors still hold sway.Also available on BDD Audio Cassette.
The story of 'Little Nell' gripped the nation when it first appeared. Described as a 'tragedy of sorrows', it tells of Nell uprooted from a secure and innocent childhood and cast into a world where evil takes many shapes, the most fascinating of which is the stunted, lecherous Quilp. He is Nell's tormenter and destroyer, and it is his demonic energy that dominates the book.
In Dorian Gray, Wilde's full-length novel, a fashionable youngman sells his soul for eternal youth and beauty. Also included inthe volume are three of the Irish master storyteller's shortworks.
Mining crimes of the past and politics, Truman ( Murder at thePentagon ) scants the basic plotting requirements of her 11thCapital Crimes case, which is marred by superfluous unsolvedmurders and an unconvincing conclusion. When the body of PaulineJuris, personal secretary of wealthy developer Wendell Tierney, isfound in the Potomac River, Tierney calls former attorney, now lawprofessor, Mackenzie Smith for advice. Mac, whose beloved wifeAnnabel wants him to stop dabbling in detection, agrees to seeWendell, but he refuses to ferret out the police line on the case,even though a former student of his heads the investigation team.Tierney, becoming chief suspect when love letters, purportedly fromhim, are found in the dead woman's apartment, again begs for Mac'shelp. Both Mac and Annabel are drawn into the case, which takes onanother twist when the suspect's adopted son, Sun Ben Cheong, isarrested for money laundering. Truman plumps up Mac's low-keysleuthing with the goings on of the fictitious Scarlet Sin
They tried to tell him that his father had killed himself, butKearney McRaven knew better. No matter what life had dealt him, hisfather would go down fighting. And as he delved deeper into themystery, he learned that just before his father died, the elderMcRaven had experienced a remarkable run of luck: he'd won nearlyten thousand dollars and the deed to a cattle ranch. Not yeteighteen, Kearney was determined enough to track down his father'smurderer and claim what was rightfully his. Now, followed everystep of the way by a shadowy figure, Kearney must solve the mysteryof his father's hidden past--a past that concealed a cold-bloodedkiller who would stop at nothing to keep a chilling secret.
Jude Fawley is a rural stone mason with intellectual aspirations. Frustrated by poverty and the indifference of the academic institutions at the University of Christminster, his only chance of fulfilment seems to lie in his relationship with his unconventional cousin, Sue Bridehead. But life as social outcasts proves undermining, and when tragedy occurs, Sue has no resilience and Jude is left in despair. Hardy's portrait of Jude,the idealist and dreamer who is a prisoner of his own physical nature,is one of the most haunting and desperate of his creations.Jude the Obscure is a dark yet compassionate account of the insurmountable frustrations of human existence which reflect Hardy's yearning for the spiritual values of the past and his despair at their decline.
Lady Chatterley's Lover is both one of the most beautiful andmost notorious love stories in modern fiction. The sunmmtion of D.H.Lawrence's artistic achievement, it sharply illustrates hisbelief that materialism robs life of its vitaliw and purpose...thattenderness and passion are the only weapons capable of saving manfrom self-destruction.This Signet Classic edition of LadyChatterley's Lover is D. H.Lawrence's masterpiece just as he wroteit. It is the complete unexpurgated text of the original Orioliedition first published in Italy in 1928, the last approved byLawrence himself.
The Dover volume collects 14 of Stoker's lesser-known horror stories such as "The Crystal Cup," "The Burial of the Rats," and "A Gipsey Prophecy." Though most of his other fiction has been overshadowed by Dracula, these offer some real chills and warrant reading. While editions of Dracula, which celebrated its centennial in 1997, are legion, Broadview's offers several extras, including a chronology of Stoker's life and appendixes on Transylvania, London, Mental Physiology, Reviews and Interviews, and more. That along with the full text make this one of the best editions available, especially at this remarkable price.
"The Lonesome Gods" is Louis L'Amour's biggest and mostimportant historical novel to date, a sweeping adventure of theCalifornia frontier. Here is the fascinating story of JohannesVerne, a young man left to die by his vengeful grandfather, rescuedby outlaws and raised in part by the Indians of the desert.Strengthened by the love of two women--Miss Nesselrode, whosemysterious past fires her ambitions for the future and Meghan, awillful young beauty--Verne grows to become a rugged adventurer, aman strong enough to embrace the awesome power of the Palm Springsdesert, and bold enough to stake a claim in the bustling world ofopportunity that was early-day Los Angeles.
This volume completes the canon of the illustrated Sherlock Holmes stories reprinted from The Strand Magazine. It contains the short story series Reminiscences of Sherlock Holmes The Valley of Fear-a sinister novella which appeared in 1914-15 - His Last Bow:The War Service of Sherlock Holmes and the last twelve stories The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes.
The Brothers Grimm rediscovered a host of fairy tales, telling of princes and princesses in their castles, witches in their towers and forests, of giants and dwarfs, of fabulous animals and dark deeds. This selection of their tales was made and translated by Lucy Crane, and includes firm favourites such as Rapunzel, The Goose Girl, Sleeping Beauty, Hansel and Gretel and Snow White. It is Illustrated throughout by Walter Crane's charming line drawings.
There are few authors who can weave nail-biting thrills,edge-of-your-seat drama, and romantic suspense as masterfully asJulie Garwood. Now she ratchets up the tension with "Murder List,"in which evil is on the hunt- and proves to be methodicallyorganized and chillingly successful. When Chicago detective AlecBuchanan is offered a prime position with the FBI, it is theperfect opportunity to leave the Windy City and follow in hisbrothers' footsteps to the top echelons of law enforcement. Butfirst he must complete one last assignment (and one that he is nottoo happy about): acting as a glorified bodyguard to hotel heiressRegan Hamilton Madison. The gorgeous exec has become entangled insome potentially deadly business. Someone has e-mailed her agraphic crime-scene photo-and the victim is no stranger. Regansuspects that the trouble started when she agreed to help ajournalist friend expose a shady self-help guru who preys onlonely, vulnerable women. In fact, the smooth-as-an-oil-slick Dr.Lawrence Shields may
Tender is the Night is a story set in tile hedonistic high society of Europe during the 'Roaring Twenties'.A wealthy schizophrenic. Nicole Warren, falls in love with Dick Diver - her psychiatrist. Tile resulting saga of the Divers troubled marriage and their circle of friends.includes a cast of aristocratic and beautiful people.unhappy love affairs, a duel. incest, and the problems inherent in the possession of great wealth. Despite cataloguing a maelstronl of interpersona conflict. Tender is the Night has a poignancy and warmth which springs frorn the quality of F. Scott Fitzgerald's writing and the tragic personal experiences on which the book is based.
With an Introduction and Notes by Dr T.C.B.Cook Count Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) is best known for War and Peace and Anna Karenina, commonly regarded as amongst the greatest novels ever written. He also, however, wrote many masterly short stories, and this volume contains four of the longest and best in distinguished translations that have stood the test of time. In the early story 'Family Happiness', Tolstoy explores courtship and marriage from the point of view of a young wife. In 'The Kreutzer Sonata' he gives us a terrifying study of marital breakdown, in 'The Devil' a powerful depiction of the power of sexual temptation, and, in perhaps the finest of all, 'The Death of Ivan Ilyich', he portrays the long agony of a man gradually coming to terms with his own mortality.
This story of a modest, peace-loving Indian, forced to side withrebels to save his family—only to become a compulsivemilitarist—has been compared to the works of Chekhov and Gorky as apowerful and insightful portrait of social upheaval.
When friends stop trusting each other, Darkness is there to fan the flames…. Things have turned black at the House of Night. Zoey Redbird’s soul has shattered. With everything she’s ever stood for falling apart, and a broken heart making her want to stay in the Otherworld forever, Zoey’s fading fast. It’s seeming more and more doubtful that she will be able pull herself back together in time to rejoin her friends and set the world to rights. As the only living person who can reach her, Stark must find a way to get to her. But how? He will have to die to do so, the Vampyre High Council stipulates. And then Zoey will give up for sure. There are only 7 days left… Enter BFF Stevie Rae. She wants to help Z but she has massive problems of her own. The rogue Red Fledglings are acting up, and this time not even Stevie Rae can protect them from the consequences. Her kinda boyfriend, Dallas, is sweet but too nosy for his own good. The truth is, Stevie Rae’s hiding a secret that
In this exciting collection of short stories, Louis L'Amour, thelegendary voice of the American West, celebrates the unique breedof men who worked the great cattle ranches. Men like Dan Regan, whorefused to surrender when trouble came -- Con Fargo, who wouldfight for what was his--despite the odds -- Rowdy Horn, asmall-time rancher with big-time dreams -- Tandy Thayer, too loyalto forget a friend ... Bill Carey, who might have fallen low, butnot low enough to let the likes of Tabat Ryerson ride off with awoman like Jane Conway -- and in the classic title story, DannyLonigan, a hard rider who faced a group of rustlers withoutfear--or mercy.
Jane Evre ranks as one of the greatest and most perennially popular works of English fiction. Althoughthe poor but plucky heroine is outwardly of plain appearance, she possesses an indornitable spirit, a sharp wit and great courage. She is forced to battleagainst the exigencies of a cruel guardian, a harsh employer and a rigid social order. All of which circumscribe her life and position when she becomes governess to the daughter of the mysterious sardonic and attractive Mr Rochester. However there is great kindness and warmth in this epic love story, which is set against the magnificent backdrop of the Yorkshire moors. Ultimately the grand passion of lane and Rochester is called upon to survivecruel revelation, loss and reunion, only to be confrontedwith tragedy.
Book De*ion Dean Koontz’s uniquetalent for writing terrifying thrillers with a heart and soul isnowhere more evident than in this latest suspense masterpiece thatpits one man against the ultimate deadline. If there were speedlimits for the sheer pulse-racing excitement allowed in one novel,Velocity would break them all. Get ready for the ride of yourlife. From Publishers Weekly Starred Review. A diabolic killer plays a harrowing game of catand mouse with a reclusive bartender in Koontz's latest grippingsuspense thriller. Billy Wiles, a 30-something bartender and formerwriter, is content with his solitary Napa County existencelistening to "beer-based psychoanalysis" from tavern regulars;visiting his hospitalized, comatose fiancée, Barbara; and carvingwood sculptures. But the simple life gets mighty complicated whenhe finds a note with a deadly, time-sensitive ultimatum: he mustchoose between the death of a young schoolteacher or an elderlyhumanitarian in six hours. Reluctant local s
Published in 1813, Pride and Prejudice announced the arrival of the comedy of manners, a welcome change from the stiff, moralistic novels of the past. In recounting the courtship of the witty, indpendent Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy--the handsome bachelor whose arrogant pride Elizabeth regards as a fatal flaw--Austen illuminates, with subtle humor, the prejudices of society as a whole. 作者简介： Though the domain of Jane Austen's novels was as circumscribes as her life, her caustic wit and keen observation made her the equal of the greatest novelists in any language. Born the seventh child of the rector of Steventon, Hampshire, on December 16, 1775, she was educated mainly at home. At an early age she began writing sketches and satires of popular novels for her family's entertainment. As a clergyman's daughter from a well-connected family, she had ample opportunity to study the habits of the middle class, the gentry, and the aristocracy. At twenty-one, she began a novel called "First Impressi
