Classics Library

It is hay-making time on the Wookey farm. Two brothers are building the haystack, but thinking about other things – about young women, and love. There are angry words, and then a fight between the brothers. But the work goes on, visitors come and go, and the long hot summer day slowly turns to evening. Then the sun goes down, covering the world with a carpet of darkness. From the hedges around the hayfield comes the rich, sweet smell of wild flowers, and the hay will make a fine, soft bed.

LOVE, POWER and HONOR In the turbulent days of fifteenth-century Italy, a professional soldier could win undying glory if he had a quick sword and a strong arm. Bartolommeo Colleoni had both—and a fabulous stolen treasure to go with them. But, like every soldier, he had a chink in his armor. Colleoni's weakness was women. Bart found himself torn by his passion for two beauties-one dark, one fair-each intensely desirable in her own way, and both as treacherous as they were bewitching.

Penguin Classics presents Thomas Hardy’s The Return of the Native, adapted for audio and available as a digital download as part of the Penguin English Library series. Read by the actor Steven Pacey. Do I desire unreasonably much in wanting what is called life - music, poetry, passion, war, and all the beating and pulsing that is going on in the great arteries of the world? Tempestuous Eustacia Vye passes her days dreaming of passionate love and the escape it may bring from the small community of Egdon Heath.

Dolly is twenty-three and about to marry the Honourable Owen Bigham. Her wedding day is filled with hasty and chaotic preparations for the entire household. Matters are complicated further by Dolly swigging from a bottle of Jamaica rum, which she later transfers into the folds of her white dress. Will she arrive at her own wedding on time, or will the fumbling advances of Joseph, the man she really loves, get in the way?

Penguin Classics presents Anthony Trollope’s Barchester Towers, adapted for listening and now available as a digital audiobook as part of the Penguin English Library series. The text is read by the actor David Timson. Trollope's comic masterpiece of plotting and backstabbing opens as the Bishop of Barchester lies on his deathbed. Soon a pitched battle breaks out over who will take power, involving, among others, the zealous reformer Dr Proudie, his fiendish wife, and the unctuous schemer Obadiah Slope.

This inspirational audiobook encapsulates African American history and invites conversations at all levels. Carole Boston Weatherford’s riveting text is an informative reminder of yesterday, a hopeful image for today, and an aspirational dream of tomorrow. Starting from 1619 and stretching more than four hundred years, this audiobook features such pivotal moments in history as the arrival of enslaved people in Jamestown, Virginia; Nat Turner's rebellion; the integration of the US military; and more.

The wind is strong on the Yorkshire moors. There are few trees, and fewer houses, to block its path. There is one house, however, that does not hide from the wind. It stands out from the hill and challenges the wind to do its worst. The house is called Wuthering Heights. When Mr Earnshaw brings a strange, small, dark child back home to Wuthering Heights, it seems he has opened his doors to trouble. He has invited in something that, like the wind, is safer kept out of the house.

Since it was first published in 1964, Whistle for Willie has delighted millions with the story of Peter, who longs to whistle for his dog.

Charles Wallace Murry is old enough to start school, but his sister, Meg, and their friend Calvin know he isn't cut out for school on Earth - Meg worries that he'll be more misunderstood than ever. Luckily, with the help of the three celestial creatures - Mrs. Whatsit, Mrs. Who, and Mrs. Which - there is another place where Charles Wallace can get his education: Intergalactic P.S. 3, a public school in a completely different galaxy.

One day, a mysterious stranger arrives at a boardinghouse of the widow Gateau - a sad-faced stranger, who keeps to himself. When the widow’s daughter, Mirette, discovers him crossing the courtyard on air, she begs him to teach her how he does it. But Mirette doesn’t know that the stranger was once the Great Bellini - master wire-walker. Or that Bellini has been stopped by a terrible fear. And it is she who must teach him courage once again.

No story has captured the magic and sense of possibility of the first snowfall better than The Snowy Day. Universal in its appeal, the story has become a favorite of millions, as it reveals a child's wonder at a new world, and the hope of capturing and keeping that wonder forever. The adventures of a little boy in the city on a very snowy day.

This Raging Bull Publishing Box Set contains four Western books by Charles Alden Seltzer, including: The Boss of the Lazy Y (1915) - Calumet Marston returns to his father's ranch to find it's being run by a young woman who remains in charge until he accepts sundry conditions. Coming of the Law (1912) - A young eastern newspaper man goes West to a small town and takes charge of a run-down newspaper, fights against an association of cattle rustlers for the benefit of the small ranchers, and wins. ’Drag’ Harlan and ’Firebrand’ Trevison are also included.

Ethan Frome works his unproductive farm and struggles to maintain a bearable existence with his difficult, suspicious, and hypochondriac wife, Zeena. But when Zeena’s vivacious cousin enters their household as a "hired girl", Ethan finds himself obsessed with her and with the possibilities for happiness she comes to represent. In one of American fiction’s finest and most intense narratives, Edith Wharton moves this ill-starred trio towards their tragic destinies. Part of a series of vintage recordings taken from the Penguin Archives. Affordable, collectable, quality productions - perfect for on-the-go listening.

This Cyanide Publishing box set contains four classic crime/mystery audiobooks, including The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley, A Strange Disappearance, The Almost Perfect Murder, and Arsene Lupin. Visit www.CyanidePublishing.com - home to the greatest mysteries.

The Marquis lay there, like stone, with a knife pushed into his heart. On his chest lay a piece of paper, with the words: Drive him fast to the grave. This is from JACQUES. ’The French Revolution brings terror and death to many people. But even in these troubled times people can still love and be kind. They can be generous and true-hearted . . . and brave. An Oxford Bookworms Library reader for learners of English, adapted from the Charles Dickens original by Ralph Mowat.

Jane Eyre is alone in the world. Disliked by her aunt’s family, she is sent away to school. Here she learns that a young girl, with neither money nor family to support her, can expect little from the world. She survives, but she wants more from life than simply to survive: she wants respect, and love. When she goes to work for Mr Rochester, she hopes she has found both at once. But the sound of strange laughter, late at night, behind a locked door, warns her that her troubles are only beginning.

A collection of short stories from such favorites as Wilkie Collins, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and Rudyard Kipling are joined by others written anonymously in this anthology which will have you scratching your head and listening just a bit longer to discover the key to the mysteries.

You are walking through the streets of London. It is getting dark and you want to get home quickly. You enter a narrow side-street. Everything is quiet, but as you pass the door of a large, windowless building, you hear a key turning in the lock. A man comes out and looks at you. You have never seen him before, but you realize immediately that he hates you. You are shocked to discover, also, that you hate him. Who is this man that everybody hates?

From ‘The Manchester Marriage’, in which a husband, supposedly drowned at sea, returns to find his daughter, to the two sisters who are comically adrift after the death of their domineering father in ‘The Daughters of the Late Colonel’, and a young girl who enlists the help of a sorceress to win back her boyfriend in ‘The Goodness of Saint Rocque’, Standing Her Ground showcases nine groundbreaking women writers.

When a handsome young man begins to court Catherine Sloper, she feels she is very lucky. She is a quiet, gentle girl, but neither beautiful nor clever; no one had ever admired her before, or come to the front parlour of her home in Washington Square to whisper soft words of love to her. But in New York in the 1840s young ladies are not free to marry where they please. Catherine must have her father’s permission, and Dr Sloper is a rich man.