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The Sleeper Awakes
By H. G. Wells. 2005
A troubled insomniac in 1890s England falls suddenly into a sleep-like trance, from which he does not awake for over…
two hundred years. During his centuries of slumber, however, investments are made that make him the richest and most powerful man on Earth. But when he comes out of his trance he is horrified to discover that the money accumulated in his name is being used to maintain a hierarchal society in which most are poor, and more than a third of all people are enslaved. Oppressed and uneducated, the masses cling desperately to one dream - that the sleeper will awake, and lead them all to freedom.Sketches by Boz
By Charles Dickens. 1995
'Sets out the London of the 1830s before you, streets, people, pleasures, low life, prisons' Claire TomalinCharles Dickens's first published…
book, Sketches by Boz is a funny and touching collection of observation, fancy and fiction showing the London he knew in all its complexity - its streets, theatres, inns, pawnshops, law courts, prisons and, of course, the river Thames. His descriptions of everyday life and people seem to anticipate characters from his great novels - garrulous matrons, vulgar young clerks, Scrooge-like bachelors - while his powers of social critique shine in his unflinching depictions of the city's forgotten citizens, from child workers to prostitutes. This edition includes the original illustrations by George Cruikshank.Edited with an Introduction and Notes by Dennis WalderSilas Marner (The Penguin English Library)
By George Eliot. 2012
"God gave her to me because you turned your back upon her, and He looks upon her as mine: you've…
no right to her!"Wrongly accused of theft and exiled from a religious community many years before, the embittered weaver Silas Marner lives alone in Raveloe, living only for work and his precious hoard of money. But when his money is stolen and an orphaned child finds her way into his house, Silas is given the chance to transform his life. His fate, and that of the little girl he adopts, is entwined with Godfrey Cass, son of the village Squire, who, like Silas, is trapped by his past. Silas Marner, George Eliot's favourite of her novels, combines humour, rich symbolism and pointed social criticism to create an unsentimental but affectionate portrait of rural life.The Penguin English Library - 100 editions of the best fiction in English, from the eighteenth century and the very first novels to the beginning of the First World War.Silas Marner
By George Eliot. 1996
Wrongly accused of theft and exiled from a religious community many years before, the embittered weaver Silas Marner lives alone…
in Raveloe, living only for work and his precious hoard of money. But when his money is stolen and an orphaned child finds her way into his house, Silas is given the chance to transform his life. His fate, and that of the little girl he adopts, is entwined with Godfrey Cass, son of the village Squire, who, like Silas, is trapped by his past. Silas Marner, George Eliot's favourite of her novels, combines humour, rich symbolism and pointed social criticism to create an unsentimental but affectionate portrait of rural life.Silas Marner
By George Eliot. 2010
A heartwarming and poignant tale of a lonely man brought back to life and faith. Silas Marner lives a friendless…
and isolated existence near the country village of Raveloe, hoarding his gold. One night his fortune is stolen and Silas loses everything he holds dear. But then the golden-haired child Eppie appears in his home, and Silas begins to reform bonds of faith and human connectedness that he once renounced forever. 'A great novel of unquenchable optimism and boundless humanity' GuardianThe Sign of Four
By Arthur Conan Doyle. 2011
'You are a wronged woman and shall have justice. Do not bring police. If you do, all will be in…
vain. Your unknown friend.'When a beautiful young woman is sent a letter inviting her to a sinister assignation, she immediately seeks the advice of the consulting detective Sherlock Holmes. For this is not the first mysterious item Mary Marston has received in the post. Every year for the last six years an anonymous benefactor has sent her a large lustrous pearl. Now it appears the sender of the pearls would like to meet her to right a wrong. But when Sherlock Holmes and his faithful sidekick Watson, aiding Miss Marston, attend the assignation, they embark on a dark and mysterious adventure involving a one-legged ruffian, some hidden treasure, deadly poison darts and a thrilling race along the River Thames.The Sign of Four (The Penguin English Library)
By Arthur Conan Doyle. 1891
The Penguin English Library editionA dense yellow miasma swirls in the streets of London as Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson…
accompany a beautiful young woman to a sinister assignation. For Mary Marston has received several large pearls - one a year for the last six years - and now a mystery letter telling her she is a wronged woman. If she would seek justice she is to meet her unknown benefactor, bringing with her two companions. But unbeknownst to them all, others stalk London's fog-enshrouded streets: a one-legged ruffian with revenge on his mind - and his companion, who places no value on human life . . .The Sign of Four
By Arthur Conan Doyle. 2001
As a dense yellow fog swirls through the streets of London, a deep melancholy has descended on Sherlock Holmes, who…
sits in a cocaine-induced haze at 221B Baker Street. His mood is only lifted by a visit from a beautiful but distressed young woman - Mary Morstan, whose father vanished ten years before. Four years later she began to receive an exquisite gift every year: a large, lustrous pearl. Now she has had an intriguing invitation to meet her unknown benefactor and urges Holmes and Watson to accompany her. And in the ensuing investigation - which involves a wronged woman, a stolen hoard of Indian treasure, a wooden-legged ruffian, a helpful dog and a love affair - even the jaded Holmes is moved to exclaim, 'Isn't it gorgeous!'A Sicilian Romance
By Ann Radcliffe. 2010
A desolate castle hides a family's shameful secrets ...On the rocky northern shores of Sicily stands a lonely castle, the…
home of the aristocratic Mazzini family. The marquis of Mazzini has remarried and gone away to live with his new wife, abandoning his two daughters - sweet-natured Emilia and lively, imaginative Julia - to wander the labyrinthine corridors alone. His only involvement with their lives is to arrange a marriage between Julia and the cruel Duke de Luovo, even though she loves another. But that is not the end of Julia's troubles. Strange lights and unearthly groaning noises are coming from parts of the castle that have been locked up for years. Is it occupied by some terrible supernatural power? Or do even darker secrets lie within its depths?The Shooting Party
By Anton Chekhov. 2004
When a young woman dies during a shooting party at the country estate of a dissolute count, a magistrate is…
called upon to investigate. The mystery deepens and suspicion falls more widely as it emerges that the dead woman was at the centre of a tangled web of relationships: with her elderly husband, with the lecherous count, and with the magistrate himself...Shock Therapy (Penguin Modern Classics)
By Varlam Shalamov. 1980
Merzlakov, once a robust stable-hand, now fights hunger, pain and exhaustion after a year and a half at a labour…
camp. An enormous man given little food, he sees the larger men dying first, their bodies conquered by starvation. In his desperation for survival, he begins a yearlong struggle of pain and injury. It ends with the inscrutable and punctilious Dr Peter Ivanovich. In a curious mix of empathy and haunting objectivity, this short story describes a snapshot of life in a Russian labour-camp. Written after Varlam Shalamov's own experiences at a gulag, it is one episode in the many that make up Kolyma Tales.Shirley (The Penguin English Library)
By Charlotte Bronte. 2012
With an essay by Helene Moglen.'Alas, Experience! No other mentor has so wasted and frozen a face as yours: none…
wears a robe so black, none bears a rod so heavy ...'Struggling manufacturer Robert Moore has introduced labour saving machinery to his Yorkshire mill, arousing a ferment of unemployment and discontent among his workers. Robert considers marriage to the wealthy and independent Shirley Keeldar to solve his financial woes, yet his heart lies with his cousin Caroline, who, bored and desperate, lives as a dependent in her uncle's home with no prospect of a career. Shirley, meanwhile, is in love with Robert's brother, an impoverished tutor - a match opposed by her family. As industrial unrest builds to a potentially fatal pitch, can the four be reconciled?The Penguin English Library - 100 editions of the best fiction written in English, from the eighteenth century and the very first novels to the beginning of the First World War.Shirley
By Charlotte Bronte. 2006
Struggling manufacturer Robert Moore has introduced labour saving machinery to his Yorkshire mill, arousing a ferment of unemployment and discontent…
among his workers. Robert considers marriage to the wealthy and independent Shirley Keeldar to solve his financial woes, yet his heart lies with his cousin Caroline, who, bored and desperate, lives as a dependent in her uncle's home with no prospect of a career. Shirley, meanwhile, is in love with Robert's brother, an impoverished tutor - a match opposed by her family. As industrial unrest builds to a potentially fatal pitch, can the four be reconciled? Set during the Napoleonic wars at a time of national economic struggles, Shirley (1849) is an unsentimental, yet passionate depiction of conflict between classes, sexes and generations.Sherlock: A Study in Scarlet
By Arthur Conan Doyle. 2011
The hit BBC series Sherlock, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, offers a fresh, contemporary take on the classic Arthur Conan Doyle stories,…
and has helped introduce a whole new generation of fans to the legendary detective. The debut episode took as its inspiration the very first Sherlock Holmes novel, A Study in Scarlet - and this edition of Conan Doyle's novel will allow Sherlock fans to discover, or re-discover, the power of that classic story. A Study in Scarlet is the genre-defining work with which popular crime fiction was born. A potent mix of serial murder, suspense, cryptic clues, red herrings and revenge, the novel introduces us to the world-famous characters of Sherlock Holmes, Dr Watson and Inspector Lestrade and sees Sherlock and Dr Watson meet and join forces for the first time as they track a mysterious killer that stalks London's streets.In addition to the original text, this edition also has an introduction by Sherlock co-creator Steven Moffat, who explains how it inspired the Sherlock script.Sherlock Holmes: The Adventures
By Arthur Conan Doyle. 2011
Through the foggy streets of Victorian London to the deepest countryside, the world's most famous private detective, Sherlock Holmes, and…
his trusty companion Dr Watson attempt to solve the unsolvable.Using his astounding methods of deduction, Holmes outwits the most cunning of thieves and most villainous of murderers in some of his best-known cases including 'The Speckled Band' and 'Silver Blaze'.Sixteen original classic Sherlock Holmes adventuresThe hit BBC series Sherlock, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, offers a fresh, contemporary take on the classic Sir Arthur Conan Doyle…
stories, and has helped introduce a whole new generation of fans to the legendary detective. In this new edition of Conan Doyle's first collection of short stories, Sherlock co-creator Mark Gatiss explains how these gripping tales inspired and influenced the new series.Sherlock: The Adventures contains twelve short stories first published in The Strand magazine between 1891 and 1892 and then published as a collection in October 1892. It includes some of Conan Doyle's best tales of murder and mystery, such as 'The Adventures of the Speckled Band', in which the strange last words of a dying woman 'It was the band, the speckled band!' and an inexplicable whistling in the night are the only clues Sherlock Holmes has to prevent another murder; and 'The Five Orange Pips', in which an untimely death and the discovery of the letter containing five orange pips lead to a cross-Atlantic conspiracy.She
By H. Rider Haggard. 2004
On his twenty-fifth birthday, Leo Vincey opens the silver casket that his father has left to him. It contains a…
letter recounting the legend of a white sorceress who rules an African tribe and of his father’s quest to find this remote race. To find out for himself if the story is true, Leo and his companions set sail for Zanzibar. There, he is brought face to face with Ayesha, She-who-must-be-obeyed: dictator, femme fatale, tyrant and beauty. She has been waiting for centuries for the true descendant of Kallikrates, her murdered lover, to arrive, and arrive he does – in an unexpected form. Blending breathtaking adventure with a brooding sense of mystery and menace, She is a story of romance, exploration discovery and heroism that has lost none of its power to enthrall.The Shape of Things to Come
By H. G. Wells. 2005
When Dr Philip Raven, an intellectual working for the League of Nations, dies in 1930 he leaves behind a powerful…
legacy - an unpublished 'dream book'. Inspired by visions he has experienced for many years, it appears to be a book written far into the future: a history of humanity from the date of his death up to 2105. The Shape of Things to Come provides this 'history of the future', an account that was in some ways remarkably prescient - predicting climatic disaster and sweeping cultural changes, including a Second World War, the rise of chemical warfare, and political instabilities in the Middle East.The Shadow-Line (Penguin Modern Classics)
By Joseph Conrad. 1986
A young and inexperienced sea captain finds that his first command leaves him with a ship stranded in tropical seas…
and a crew smitten with fever. As he wrestles with his conscience and with the increasing sense of isolation that he experiences, the captain crosses the ‘shadow-line’ between youth and adulthood. In many ways an autobiographical narrative, Conrad's novella was written at the start of the Great War when his son Borys was at the Western Front, and can be seen as an attempt to open humanity’s eyes to the qualities needed to face evil and destruction.Moby Dick
By Herman Melville. 2011
A PBS Great American Read Top 100 PickMelville’s classic tale of obsession and the sea, one of the most important…
and enduring masterworks of nineteenth-century literature, Moby Dick is a riveting drama, exploring rage, hope, destiny, and the deepest questions of moral truth. “Call me Ishmael.”Thus begins one of the most famous journeys in literature—the voyage of the whaling ship Pequod and its embattled, monomaniacal Captain Ahab. Ishmael quickly learns that the Pequod’s captain sails for revenge against the elusive Moby Dick, a sperm whale with a snow-white hump and mottled skin that destroyed Ahab’s former vessel and left him crippled. As the Pequod sails deeper through the nights and into the sea, the divisions between man and nature begin to blur—so do the lines between good and evil, as the fates of the ship’s crewmen become increasingly unclear. . . .