New Classics

Oblomov is the best known novel by Russian writer Ivan Goncharov, first published in 1859. Oblomov is also the central character of the novel, often seen as the ultimate incarnation of the superfluous man, a symbolic character in 19th-century Russian literature. Oblomov was compared to Shakespeare's Hamlet as answering "No!" to the question "To be or not to be?" Oblomov is a young, generous nobleman who seems incapable of making important decisions or undertaking any significant actions.

Confucius was a legendary philosopher and theorist of government. Contemporaneous with Sun Tzu, he was active in the sixth and fifth centries, BCE. Though he was largely ineffective during his own career, his approach to leadership as a highly conservative morality and study of the classics has influenced bureaucratic rule in China to this day. "The Analects", literally "Edited Conversations", is a collection of aphorisms and brief conversations attributed to Confucius, but most likely not written during his lifetime. The standard translations of this work are usually stuffed with ...

Dorothy lived in the midst of the great Kansas prairies, with Uncle Henry, who was a farmer, and Aunt Em, who was the farmer's wife. Their house was small, for the lumber to build it had to be carried by wagon many miles.

Red Pottage follows the lives of close friends Rachel West, the wealthy heiress, and Hester Gresley, the novelist. Rachel has fallen in love with Hugh Scarlett, a spineless and weak-willed man who has just ended an affair with a married woman. Hester, on the other hand, is stuck living with her brother, a pompous and critical vicar. She must contend with her brother’s disapproval of her writing, a battle which manifests itself as a nervous illness in her.

The Dove’s Nest and Other Stories is a collection of both finished and unfinished short stories written by Katherine Mansfield. The collection was published posthumously, not long after Mansfield’s death in 1923, by her husband, John Middleton Murry.

Peter Rabbit is a little cottontail who's fond of tall tales. He tells them to his mother, his sisters and even his cousin, Benny. Then, a run-in with Mr. McGregor's hungry cat causes Peter to tell one tale too many. Thinking his sisters have been boxed up and mailed to Zanzibar (a place at least 30 miles away!), Peter and Benny set out to rescue the girls. So come on! Hit the bunny trail with for a journey into pure storytelling enchantment with a rousing, rib-tickling New Adventures of Peter Rabbit!

In Cameo ~ A Profile In Courage, Mary McMahon, a Cornell University student in the year1900, mourns her lover, Casey, who dies when a wagon wheel crushes his neck. Her ashamed parents demand their pregnant daughter remain hidden until they can arrange a marriage. Mary rehearses the attitude of a lonely wife before fleeing to New York City. She lives with cockroaches in Una's tenement and rolls tobacco into cigars in Kezrat Carr's sweatshop. Checkmated by Casey who died and a child who lives, Mary trades the cameo Casey carved for her in exchange for an illegal abortion performed by Mrs. ...

Ivan Bunin was the first Russian writer of the 20th century to be awarded the Nobel Prize in literature. Like many other Russian writers, he emigrated after the Revolution and never returned to his homeland; The Life of Arseniev is the major work of his émigré period. In ways similar to Nabokov's Speak, Memory, Bunin's novel powerfully evokes the atmosphere of Russia in the decades before the Revolution and illuminates those Russian literary and cultural traditions eradicated in the Soviet era. Please note: This audiobook is in Russian.

"The New Machiavelli" purports to be written in the first person by its protagonist, Richard "Dick" Remington, who has a lifelong passion for "statecraft" and who dreams of recasting the social and political form of the English nation. Remington is a brilliant student at Cambridge, writes several books on political themes, marries an heiress and enters parliament as a Liberal influenced by the socialism of a couple easily recognisable as the Webbs, only to go over to the Conservatives.

Each of the best-selling writers represented in these selections from Legends II returns to the fantasy universe he or she made famous throughout the world. Whether set before or after events already recounted elsewhere, whether featuring beloved characters or compelling new creations, these masterful short novels are both mesmerizing stand-alones - perfect introductions to the work of their authors - and indispensable additions to the epics on which they are based.

Olivia is off-limits with a capital O 20 years younger. My best friend’s daughter. A dirty little secret that could get me killed. Her father’s a dangerous man with dangerous friends. There’s no choice but to end it. And I was going to… Until I saw her with my brother. Olivia I was devastated when Stephen pushed me away. So, I did the unthinkable. Stephen’s younger brother… Chase was recovering from a professional hockey injury. He was a temporary distraction. How was I to know he was Stephen’s younger brother? They say three’s a crowd. But, is it really? Barbi Cox delivers ...

Incunabula/Ong's Hat was a bizarre Internet phenomenon: an “immersive” online experience—part mystery, part game, part who knows what... The Incunabula Papers/Ong’s Hat was, or is, a “many-threaded, open-ended interactive narrative” that ”weds an alternate history of chaos science and consciousness studies to conspiracy theories, parallel dimensions, and claims that computer-mediated environments can serve as magical tools…. the documents provoked a widespread “immersive legend-trip” in the late 1990s.

Dubrovsky is a young nobleman whose land is confiscated by a greedy and powerful aristocrat, Kirila Petrovitch Troekurov. Determined to get justice one way or another, Dubrovsky gathers a band of serfs and goes on the rampage, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. Along the way, Dubrovsky falls in love with Masha, Troekurov's daughter, and lets his guard down, with tragic results. Please note: This audiobook is in Russian.

“Murmel, murmel, murmel,” is all Robin hears coming from a hole in her sandbox. When she reaches down and out pops a baby, she finds herself in a real fix: who will take care of it? Robin’s too little! Off she goes, searching her neighborhood for someone who needs a baby. The woman with seventeen cats doesn’t want the baby. Nor does the grumpy man by the bus stop. It looks as though all hope is lost, until a friendly truck driver passes by. He offers to trade his truck for the baby—an exchange Robin can’t refuse.

A vain emperor who loves new clothes wears a royal robe created especially for him by two swindlers.

Irish orphan Jian Byrne is beautiful, gifted and lost. She can see people’s auras, travel out-of-body to realms on high and remember perfectly. But her missing family is a wound that has never healed. When her grandmother dies Jian falls hard. She is lured into the local drug scene. One night while she sleeps a fiery being appears and reminds her of the mission she was born to fulfill. She is guided to great friends of light, comes face to face with diabolical takers and resurrects an almost hopeless quest to find her family.

The Odyssey is the second - the Iliad being the first - masterpiece by Homer. The story of a long journey by the king of Ithaca, Odysseus, as he returns home after the Trojan War has been frequently published, staged, and filmed. This audio performance of the classic epic poem is comparable to the ancient method of travelling artists who sang their poems in hexameter.

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.

Each of the best-selling writers represented in these selections from Legends II returns to the fantasy universe he or she made famous throughout the world. Whether set before or after events already recounted elsewhere, whether featuring beloved characters or compelling new creations, these masterful short novels are both mesmerizing standalones - perfect introductions to the work of their authors - and indispensable additions to the epics on which they are based.

In the winter of 1854 Tolstoy, then an officer in the Russian army, arranged to be transferred to the besieged town of Sebastopol. Wishing to see at first hand the action of what would become known as the Crimean War, he was spurred on by a fierce patriotism, but also by an equally fierce desire to alert the authorities to appalling conditions in the army. Writing with the truth as his utmost aim, he brought home to Russia's entire literate public the atrocities of war. In doing so, he realized his own vocation as a writer and established his literary reputation.