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books tagged “wisconsin”
books tagged “wisconsin”
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The Adventures of Huckleberry Finnby Mark TwainISBN 0140366768 (0-14-036676-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn'Book summary:Mark Twain's classic novel, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, tells the story of a teenaged misfit who finds himself floating on a raft down the Mississippi River with an escaping slave, Jim. In the course of their perilous journey, Huck and Jim meet adventure, danger, and a cast of characters who are sometimes menacing and often hilarious.
Though some of the situations in Huckleberry Finn are funny in themselves (the cockeyed Shakespeare production in Chapter 21 leaps instantly to mind), this book's humor is found mostly in Huck's unique worldview and his way of expressing himself. Describing his brief sojourn with the Widow Douglas after she adopts him, Huck says: "After supper she got out her book and learned me about Moses and the Bulrushers, and I was in a sweat to find out all about him; but by and by she let it out that Moses had been dead a considerable long time; so then I didn't care no more about him, because I don't take no stock in dead people." Underlying Twain's good humor is a dark subcurrent of Antebellum cruelty and injustice that makes The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn a frequently funny book with a serious message. [via]
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Aristotle: Nicomachean Ethics, Books Ii--ivby Aristotle, J. A. K. Thomson, Jonathan BarnesISBN 0140449493 (0-14-044949-3)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Aristotle: Nicomachean Ethics, Books Ii--iv'Book summary:[via]Of Aristotles works, few have had as lasting an influence on subsequent Western thought as The Nicomachean Ethics. In it, he argues that happiness consists in activity of the soul in accordance with virtue, defining virtue as both moral (courage, generosity, and justice) and intellectual (knowledge, wisdom, and insight). Aristotle also discusses the nature of practical reasoning, the different forms of friendship, and the relationship between individual virtue and the state. Featuring a lucid translation, a new introduction, updated suggestions for further reading, and a chronology of Aristotles life and works, this is the authoritative edition of a seminal intellectual masterpiece.
- New Introduction and bibliography by acclaimed scholar Jonathan Barnes
- New chronology of Aristotle's life and works
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Armadaleby Wilkie Collins, John SutherlandISBN 0140434119 (0-14-043411-9)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Armadale'Book summary:An innovative novel featuring an astonishingly wicked female villain, Wilkie Collins' "Armadale" was regarded by T.S. Eliot as 'the best of [his] romances'. This "Penguin Classics" edition is edited with an introduction and notes by John Sutherland. When the elderly Allan Armadale makes a terrible confession on his death-bed, he has little idea of the repercussions to come, for the secret he reveals involves the mysterious Lydia Gwilt: flame-haired temptress, bigamist, laudanum addict and husband-poisoner. Her malicious intrigues fuel the plot of this gripping melodrama: a tale of confused identities, inherited curses, romantic rivalries, espionage, money - and murder. The character of Lydia Gwilt horrified contemporary critics, with one reviewer describing her as 'One of the most hardened female villains whose devices and desires have ever blackened fiction'. She remains among the most enigmatic and fascinating women in nineteenth-century literature and the dark heart of this most sensational of Victorian 'sensation novels'. John Sutherland's introduction illustrated how Wilkie Collins drew on scandalous newspaper headlines and on new technology particularly the penny post and the telegraph - to lend extra pace and veracity to his tale. This edition also contains notes, further reading and an appendix on stage dramatisations of "Armadale". Wilkie Collins (1824-1889) was born in London in 1824, the eldest son of the landscape painter William Collins. In 1846 he was entered to read for the bar at Lincoln's Inn, where he gained the knowledge that was to give him much of the material for his writing. From the early 1850s he was a friend of Charles Dickens, who produced and acted in two melodramas written by Collins, "The Lighthouse" and "The Frozen Deep". Of his novels, Collins is best remembered for "The Woman in White" (1859), "No Name" (1862), "Armadale" (1866) and "The Moonstone" (1868). If you enjoyed "Armadale", you might like Collins' "No Name", also available in "Penguin Classics". [via]
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At the Back of the North Windby George MacDonaldISBN 0140350306 (0-14-035030-6)
Softcover, Penguin USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'At the Back of the North Wind'Book summary:This is a story of a poor stable boy living in Victorian London in which everyday lives are mysteriously enveloped by a power and a glory, personified here as a beautiful woman known as the North Wind. She visits the small boy, Diamond, and takes him with her on her journeys, teaching him about herself. Through the eyes of an innocent and yet perceptive child, MacDonald explores North Wind as a way of exploring the place of death in our lives. He looks squarely at social injustice--he knew poverty and the poor first hand--and yet also sees that the deepest need we have is for love and forgiveness, which are rooted in eternity.
This is a book for children--I've read it to my own daughter more than once--even though they may not understand just who North Wind is until years later. Adults on the other hand will learn that while they thought they knew something about death, there is much to relearn--and probably the most important part. --Doug Thorpe [via]
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Belovedby Toni MorrisonISBN 0140283404 (0-14-028340-4)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Beloved'Book summary:Toni Morrison gently reads her own Pulitzer Prize-winning work in the unabridged version of this riveting tale of ex-slave Sethe and the beloved ghost that haunts her. While Morrison makes occasional odd pauses in her reading, what is lost in smoothness is more than made up for in quiet intensity as the author reads words obviously deeply felt. Her intimate knowledge of the characters and their motivations lends this reading an authority that helps the listener sort out the breaks in time and dialogue in this complex story of a woman coming to terms with her enslaved past and the loss of her husband and baby daughter. (Running time: 12 hours, eight cassettes) --Kimberly Heinrichs [via]
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A Book of Bosh: Lyrics and Prose of Edward Learby Edward Lear, Brian AldersonISBN 014030665X (0-14-030665-X)
Hardcover, Puffin Books
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Charlie and the Chocolate Factoryby Roald Dahl, Quentin BlakeISBN 0141301155 (0-14-130115-5)
Softcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'Book summary:Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and its sequel, Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator, along with Roald Dahl's other tales for younger readers, make him a true star of children's literature. Dahl seems to know just how far to go with his oddball fantasies; in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, for example, nasty Violet Beauregarde blows up into a blueberry from sneaking forbidden chewing gum, and bratty Augustus Gloop is carried away on the river of chocolate he wouldn't resist. In fact, all manner of disasters can happen to the most obnoxiously deserving of children because Dahl portrays each incident with such resourcefulness and humor.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a singular delight, crammed with mad fantasy, childhood justice and revenge, and as much candy as you can eat. The book is also available in Spanish (Charlie y la Fabrica de Chocolate). (The suggested age range for this book is 9-12, but nobody this reviewer has met can resist it, including New York City bellhops, flight attendants, and grumpy teenagers.) [via]
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Charlie and the Great Glass Elevatorby Roald Dahl, Quentin BlakeISBN 0141301120 (0-14-130112-0)
Softcover, Puffin
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator'Book summary:Picking right up where Charlie and the Chocolate Factory left off, Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator continues the adventures of Charlie Bucket, his family, and Willy Wonka, the eccentric candy maker. As the book begins, our heroes are shooting into the sky in a glass elevator, headed for destinations unknown. What follows is exactly the kind of high-spirited magical madness and mayhem we've all come to expect from Willy Wonka and his creator Roald Dahl. The American space race gets a send-up, as does the President, and Charlie's family gets a second chance at childhood. Throw in the Vermicious Knids, Gnoolies, and Minusland and we once again witness pure genius. (Ages 9 to 12) [via]
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Crossing to Safetyby Wallace Earle StegnerISBN 0140112499 (0-14-011249-9)
Softcover, Penguin Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Crossing to Safety'Book summary:It's deceptively simple: two bright young couples meet during the Depression and form an instant and lifelong friendship. "How do you make a book that anyone will read out of lives as quiet as these?" Larry Morgan, a successful novelist and the narrator of the story, poses that question many years after he and his wife, Sally, have befriended the vibrant, wealthy, and often troubled Sid and Charity Lang. "Where is the high life, the conspicuous waste, the violence, the kinky sex, the death wish?" It's not here. What is here is just as fascinating, just as compelling, as touching, and as tragic.
Crossing to Safety is about loyalty and survival in its most everyday form--the need to create bonds and the urge to tear them apart. Thirty-four years after their first meeting, when Larry and Sally are called back to the Langs' summer home in Vermont, it's as if for a final showdown. How has this friendship defined them? What is its legacy? Stegner offer answers in those small, perfectly rendered moments that make up lives "as quiet as these"--and as familiar as our own. --Sara Nickerson [via]
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Crossing to Safetyby Wallace StegnerISBN 0140133488 (0-14-013348-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group (Canada)
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Crossing to Safety'Book summary:It's deceptively simple: two bright young couples meet during the Depression and form an instant and lifelong friendship. "How do you make a book that anyone will read out of lives as quiet as these?" Larry Morgan, a successful novelist and the narrator of the story, poses that question many years after he and his wife, Sally, have befriended the vibrant, wealthy, and often troubled Sid and Charity Lang. "Where is the high life, the conspicuous waste, the violence, the kinky sex, the death wish?" It's not here. What is here is just as fascinating, just as compelling, as touching, and as tragic.
Crossing to Safety is about loyalty and survival in its most everyday form--the need to create bonds and the urge to tear them apart. Thirty-four years after their first meeting, when Larry and Sally are called back to the Langs' summer home in Vermont, it's as if for a final showdown. How has this friendship defined them? What is its legacy? Stegner offer answers in those small, perfectly rendered moments that make up lives "as quiet as these"--and as familiar as our own. --Sara Nickerson [via]
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The Dahl Diary, 1992by Roald DahlISBN 0140346473 (0-14-034647-3)
Softcover, Penguin USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Dahl Diary, 1992'Book summary:Each month kicks off with some of Roald Dahl's own diary jottings, in which he tells all sorts of facts about his life, as well as a lot of detailed nature notes for each month of the year. The pages are also full of favourite characters from his books. [via]
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The Deep End of the Oceanby Jacquelyn MitchardISBN 0140286276 (0-14-028627-6)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Deep End of the Ocean'Book summary:Oprah Book Club® Selection, September 1996: The horror of losing a child is somehow made worse when the case goes unsolved for nearly a decade, reports Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel columnist Jacquelyn Mitchard in this searing first novel. In it, 3-year-old Ben Cappadora is kidnapped from a hotel lobby where his mother is checking into her 15th high school reunion. His disappearance tears the family apart and invokes separate experiences of anguish, denial, and self-blame. Marital problems and delinquency in Ben's older brother (in charge of him the day of his kidnapping) ensue. Mitchard depicts the family's friction and torment--along with many gritty realities of family life--with the candor of a journalist and compassion of someone who has seemingly been there. International publishing and movie rights sold fast on this one: It's a blockbuster. [via]
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The Devil's Arithmeticby Jane YolenISBN 0140345353 (0-14-034535-3)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Discourse on Method and the Meditationsby Rene Descartes, F. E. SutcliffeISBN 0140442065 (0-14-044206-5)
Softcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Discourse on Method and the Meditations'Book summary:Is knowledge possible? If so, what can we know and how do we come to know it? What degree of certainty does our knowledge enjoy? In these two powerful works, Descartes, the seventeenth-century philosopher considered to be the father of modern philosophy, outlines his philosophical method and then counters the sceptics of his time by insisting that certain knowledge can be had. He goes on to address the nature and extent of human knowledge, the distinction between mind and body, the existence of God, and the existence of external objects. [via]
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End of the Affairby Graham GreeneISBN 0140291091 (0-14-029109-1)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'End of the Affair'Book summary:Set in London during and just after World War II, Graham Greene's The End of the Affair is a pathos-laden examination of a three-way collision between love of self, love of another, and love of God. The affair in question involves Maurice Bendrix, a solipsistic novelist, and a dutifully married woman, Sarah Miles. The lovers meet at a party thrown by Sarah's dreary civil-servant husband, and proceed to liberate each other from boredom and routine unhappiness. Reflecting on the ebullient beginnings of their romance, Bendrix recalls: "There was never any question in those days of who wanted whom--we were together in desire." Indeed, the affair goes on unchecked for several years until, during an afternoon tryst, Bendrix goes downstairs to look for intruders in his basement and a bomb falls on the building. Sarah rushes down to find him lying under a fallen door, and immediately makes a deal with God, whom she has never particularly cared for. "I love him and I'll do anything if you'll make him alive.... I'll give him up forever, only let him be alive with a chance.... People can love each other without seeing each other, can't they, they love You all their lives without seeing You."
Bendrix, as evidenced by his ability to tell the story, is not dead, merely unconscious, and so Sarah must keep her promise. She breaks off the relationship without giving a reason, leaving Bendrix mystified and angry. The only explanation he can think of is that she's left him for another man. It isn't until years later, when he hires a private detective to ascertain the truth, that he learns of her impassioned vow. Sarah herself comes to understand her move through a strange rationalization. Writing to God in her journal, she says:
You willed our separation, but he [Bendrix] willed it too. He worked for it with his anger and his jealousy, and he worked for it with his love. For he gave me so much love, and I gave him so much love that soon there wasn't anything left, when we'd finished, but You.
It's as though the pull toward faith were inevitable, if incomprehensible--perhaps as punishment for her sin of adultery. In her final years, Sarah's faith only deepens, even as she remains haunted by the bombing and the power of her own attraction to God. Set against the backdrop of a war-ravaged city, The End of the Affair is equally haunting as it lays forth the question of what constitutes love in troubling, unequivocal terms. --Melanie Rehak [via] -
The Ethics of Aristotle: The Nicomachean Ethicsby AristotelesISBN 0140440550 (0-14-044055-0)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Ethics of Aristotle: The Nicomachean Ethics'Book summary:A vigorous polemicist as well as a rational philosopher, Aristotle (384 - 322 BCE) has the task in his ethics of demonstrating how men become good and why happiness can, and should, be our goal. The success of Aristotle's endeavour may be measured by the enormous impact of his ethics on Western moral philosophy through the centuries. Composed as mere lecture notes, it possesses a startling boldness and represents an exacting, exciting challenge to the reader. By converting ethics from a theoretical to a practical science, and by introducing psychology into his study of behaviour, Aristotle both widens the field of moral philosophy and simultaneously makes it more accessible to anyone who seeks an understanding of human nature. [via]
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Fools Crowby James WelchISBN 0140089373 (0-14-008937-3)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Fools Crow'Book summary:[via]The year is 1870, and Fool's Crow, so called after he killed the chief of the Crows during a raid, has a vision at the annual Sun Dance ceremony. The young warrior sees the end of the Indian way of life and the choice that must be made: resistance or humiliating accommodation.
"A major contibution to Native American literature." Wallace Stegner.
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Frances Hodgson Burnett's the Secret Gardenby Frances Hodgson Burnett, Robin LawrieISBN 0140366660 (0-14-036666-0)
Softcover, Puffin
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Frances Hodgson Burnett's the Secret Garden'Book summary:Mistress Mary is quite contrary until she helps her garden grow. Along the way, she manages to cure her sickly cousin Colin, who is every bit as imperious as she. These two are sullen little peas in a pod, closed up in a gloomy old manor on the Yorkshire moors of England, until a locked-up garden captures their imaginations and puts the blush of a wild rose in their cheeks; "It was the sweetest, most mysterious-looking place any one could imagine. The high walls which shut it in were covered with the leafless stems of roses which were so thick, that they matted together.... 'No wonder it is still,' Mary whispered. 'I am the first person who has spoken here for ten years.'" As new life sprouts from the earth, Mary and Colin's sour natures begin to sweeten. For anyone who has ever felt afraid to live and love, The Secret Garden's portrayal of reawakening spirits will thrill and rejuvenate. Frances Hodgson Burnett creates characters so strong and distinct, young readers continue to identify with them even 85 years after they were conceived. (Ages 9 to 12) [via]
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- Frances Hodgson Burnett's the Secret Garden: ISBN 0141182180 (0-14-118218-0)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA - Frances Hodgson Burnett's the Secret Garden: ISBN 0141309318 (0-14-130931-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA - Frances Hodgson Burnett's the Secret Garden: ISBN 0140366660 (0-14-036666-0)
Softcover, Puffin
- Frances Hodgson Burnett's the Secret Garden: ISBN 0141182180 (0-14-118218-0)
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The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religionby James George FrazerISBN 0140189319 (0-14-018931-9)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion'Book summary:Draws on myths, rituals, totems and taboos fo ancient European and primitive cultures throughout the world. the third edition of this monumental study of folklore, magic, and religion was abridged by the authour into this single volume in 1922.[via]More editions of The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion:
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The Good Soldierby Ford Madox FordISBN 0140180818 (0-14-018081-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Good Soldier'Book summary:First published in 1915, Ford Madox Ford's The Good Soldier begins, famously and ominously, "This is the saddest story I have ever heard." The book then proceeds to confute this pronouncement at every turn, exposing a world less sad than pathetic, and more shot through with hypocrisy and deceit than its incredulous narrator, John Dowell, cares to imagine. Somewhat forgotten as a classic, The Good Soldier has been called everything from the consummate novelist's novel to one of the greatest English works of the century. And although its narrative hook--the philandering of an otherwise noble man--no longer shocks, its unerring cadences and doleful inevitabilities proclaim an enduring appeal.
Ford's novel revolves around two couples: Edward Ashburnham--the title's soldier--and his capable if off-putting wife, Leonora; and long-transplanted Americans John and Florence Dowell. The foursome's ostensible amiability, on display as they pass parts of a dozen pre-World War I summers together in Germany, conceals the fissures in each marriage. John is miserably mismatched with the garrulous, cuckolding Florence; and Edward, dashing and sentimental, can't refrain from falling in love with women whose charms exceed Leonora's. Predictably, Edward and Florence conduct their affair, an indiscretion only John seems not to notice. After the deaths of the two lovers, and after Leonora explains much of the truth to John, he recounts the events of their four lives with an extended inflection of outrage. From his retrospective perch, his recollections simmer with a bitter skepticism even as he expresses amazement at how much he overlooked.
Dowell's resigned narration is flawlessly conversational--haphazard, sprawling, lusting for sympathy. He exudes self-preservation even as he alternately condemns and lionizes Edward: "If I had had the courage and the virility and possibly also the physique of Edward Ashburnham I should, I fancy, have done much what he did." Stunningly, Edward's adultery comes to seem not merely excusable, but almost sublime. "Perhaps he could not bear to see a woman and not give her the comfort of his physical attractions," John surmises. Ford's novel deserves its reputation if for no other reason than the elegance with which it divulges hidden lives. --Ben Guterson [via]
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The Good Soldier: A Tale of Passionby Ford Madox FordISBN 0140283315 (0-14-028331-5)
Softcover, Penguin Group (Canada)
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Good Soldier: A Tale of Passion'Book summary:Set just before World War I, The Good Soldier chronicles the tragedies of the lives of two seemingly perfect couples. The novel is told using a series of flashbacks, it also makes use of the device of the unreliable narrator as the main character gradually reveals a version of events that is quite different from what the introduction leads you to believe. The novel was loosely based on two incidents of adultery and on Ford's messy personal life. [via]
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Gorgiasby Plato, C.J. Emlyn-Jones, Chris Emlyn-JonesISBN 0140449043 (0-14-044904-3)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Gorgias'Book summary:Taking the form of a dialogue between Socrates, Gorgias, Polus and Callicles, GORGIAS debates perennial questions about the nature of government and those who aspire to public office.
Are high moral standards essential or should we give our preference to the pragmatist who gets things done or negotiates successfully? Should individuals be motivated by a desire for personal power and prestige, or genuine concern for the moral betterment of the citizens?
These questions go to the heart of Athenian democratic principles and are more relevant than ever in today's political climate.
[via] -
Great Gatsbyby F. Scott FitzgeraldISBN 0140620184 (0-14-062018-4)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Great Gatsby'Book summary:[via]Kathleen Parkinson places this brilliant and bitter satire on the moral failure of the jazz age firmly in the context of F. Scott Fitzgerald's life and times. She explores the intricate patterns of the novel, its chronology, locations, imagery and use of colour, and how these contribute to a seamless interplay of social comedy and symbolic landscape. She devotes a perceptive chapter to F. Scott Fitzgerald's controversial portrayal of women and goes on to discuss how the central characters, Gatsby and Nick Carraway, embody and confront the dualism inherent in the American Dream.
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Gulliver's Travelsby Jonathan SwiftISBN 0140382402 (0-14-038240-2)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Gulliver's Travels'Book summary:Combining travel narrative and powerful satire, GULLIVER'S TRAVELS was an immediate success when it was published in 1726. As soon as Lemuel Gulliver is shipwrecked on the island of Lilliput, Swift's distortion of reality begins and man is seen as a diminished, magnified, abstracted, and finally bestial species. Whether expurgated and adapted for children, or read as a biting and incisive satire on humanity, the novel continues to appeal to readers on a variety of levels. [via]
Happy Prince and Other Storiesby Oscar WildeISBN 0140350500 (0-14-035050-0)
Softcover, Penguin USA
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The Hauntingby Shirley JacksonISBN 0140287434 (0-14-028743-4)
Softcover, Penguin Group (Canada)
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Haunting'Book summary:Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House has unnerved readers since its original publication in 1959. A tale of subtle, psychological terror, it has earned its place as one of the significant haunted house stories of the ages.
Eleanor Vance has always been a loner--shy, vulnerable, and bitterly resentful of the 11 years she lost while nursing her dying mother. "She had spent so long alone, with no one to love, that it was difficult for her to talk, even casually, to another person without self-consciousness and an awkward inability to find words." Eleanor has always sensed that one day something big would happen, and one day it does. She receives an unusual invitation from Dr. John Montague, a man fascinated by "supernatural manifestations." He organizes a ghost watch, inviting people who have been touched by otherworldly events. A paranormal incident from Eleanor's childhood qualifies her to be a part of Montague's bizarre study--along with headstrong Theodora, his assistant, and Luke, a well-to-do aristocrat. They meet at Hill House--a notorious estate in New England.
Hill House is a foreboding structure of towers, buttresses, Gothic spires, gargoyles, strange angles, and rooms within rooms--a place "without kindness, never meant to be lived in...."
Although Eleanor's initial reaction is to flee, the house has a mesmerizing effect, and she begins to feel a strange kind of bliss that entices her to stay. Eleanor is a magnet for the supernatural--she hears deathly wails, feels terrible chills, and sees ghostly apparitions. Once again she feels isolated and alone--neither Theo nor Luke attract so much eerie company. But the physical horror of Hill House is always subtle; more disturbing is the emotional torment Eleanor endures. Intense, literary, and harrowing, The Haunting of Hill House belongs in the same dark league as Henry James's classic ghost story, The Turn of the Screw. --Naomi Gesinger [via]
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Haunting of Hill Houseby Shirley JacksonISBN 0140071083 (0-14-007108-3)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Haunting of Hill House'Book summary:Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House has unnerved readers since its original publication in 1959. A tale of subtle, psychological terror, it has earned its place as one of the significant haunted house stories of the ages.
Eleanor Vance has always been a loner--shy, vulnerable, and bitterly resentful of the 11 years she lost while nursing her dying mother. "She had spent so long alone, with no one to love, that it was difficult for her to talk, even casually, to another person without self-consciousness and an awkward inability to find words." Eleanor has always sensed that one day something big would happen, and one day it does. She receives an unusual invitation from Dr. John Montague, a man fascinated by "supernatural manifestations." He organizes a ghost watch, inviting people who have been touched by otherworldly events. A paranormal incident from Eleanor's childhood qualifies her to be a part of Montague's bizarre study--along with headstrong Theodora, his assistant, and Luke, a well-to-do aristocrat. They meet at Hill House--a notorious estate in New England.
Hill House is a foreboding structure of towers, buttresses, Gothic spires, gargoyles, strange angles, and rooms within rooms--a place "without kindness, never meant to be lived in...."
Although Eleanor's initial reaction is to flee, the house has a mesmerizing effect, and she begins to feel a strange kind of bliss that entices her to stay. Eleanor is a magnet for the supernatural--she hears deathly wails, feels terrible chills, and sees ghostly apparitions. Once again she feels isolated and alone--neither Theo nor Luke attract so much eerie company. But the physical horror of Hill House is always subtle; more disturbing is the emotional torment Eleanor endures. Intense, literary, and harrowing, The Haunting of Hill House belongs in the same dark league as Henry James's classic ghost story, The Turn of the Screw. --Naomi Gesinger [via]
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Heartbreak Houseby Bernard Shaw, Dan H. LaurenceISBN 0140437878 (0-14-043787-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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A History of Readingby Alberto ManguelISBN 0140166548 (0-14-016654-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'A History of Reading'Book summary:This wide-ranging and erudite exploration of the topic of reading is suffused with the spirit of Manguel's fellow Argentinian Jorge Luis Borges. Manguel takes us through the history of reading as if leading us room by room through the infinite library Borges constructed in one of his famous stories. Manguel's approach is not chronological, but thematic. His chapter topics jump from attempts to censor reading to the physical surroundings favored by readers, from the limitations of translations to the esotericism of books written for a restricted readership. Throughout he moves easily through time and geography to quote anecdotes and examples from diverse sources. Manguel's enthusiasm, and the impressive breadth of his reading, will make his readers eager to rush to the nearest library. [via]
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Island of Hope, Island of Tearsby Frank BrownstoneISBN 0140088202 (0-14-008820-2)
Softcover, Penguin USA
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James and the Giant Peachby Roald Dahl, Lane SmithISBN 0140374248 (0-14-037424-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'James and the Giant Peach'Book summary:Roald Dahl's classic children's novel is now a motion picture from The Walt Disney Company, and this version of James and the Giant Peach grew out of the making of the movie. Lane Smith, conceptual artist for the film, has given James and company a new and arresting look, much in the style of his many highly regarded books, such as Math Curse and The Stinky Cheeseman. Karey Kirkpatrick, the film's screenwriter, created a text that is true to the spirit of Dahl's original, and deftly pulls young readers into the remarkable story. All in all, it's a peach of a book sure to be the pick of every child's bookshelf! [via]
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The Jungle Bookby Rudyard Kipling, Daniel KarlinISBN 0140183167 (0-14-018316-7)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Jungle Books'Book summary:This is the classic story of friendship between man and beast. Saved from the jaws of the evil tiger Shere Khan, young Mowgli is adopted by a wolf pack and taught the law of the jungle by lovable old Baloo the bear and Bhageera the panther. The adventures of Rikki-Tikki-Tavi the snake-fighting mongoose, little Toomai and the elephant's secret dance, and Kotick the white seal are all part of Mowgli's extraordinary journey with his animal friends. [via]
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Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraftby Claire TomalinISBN 0140167617 (0-14-016761-7)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft'Book summary:Witty, courageous and unconventional, Mary Wollstonecraft was one of the most controversial figures of her day. She published "A Vindication of the Rights of Woman"; travelled to revolutionary France and lived through the Terror and the destruction of the incipient French feminist movement; produced an illegitimate daughter; and married William Godwin before dying in childbed at the age of thirty-eight. Often embattled and bitterly disappointed, she never gave up her radical ideas or her belief that courage and honesty would triumph over convention. Winner of the Whitbread First Book Prize in 1974, this haunting biography achieved wide critical acclaim. Writing in the "New Statesman", J. H. Plumb called it, 'Wide, penetrating, sympathetic. There is no better book on Mary Wollstonecraft, nor is there likely to be'. [via]
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Lives on the Boundary: A Moving Account of the Struggles and Achievements of America's Educational Underclassby Mike RoseISBN 0140124039 (0-14-012403-9)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Lost in Translation: A Life in a New Languageby Eva HoffmanISBN 0140127739 (0-14-012773-9)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Lost in Translation: A Life in a New Language'Book summary:The condition of exile is an exaggeration of the process of change and loss that many people experience as they grow and mature, leaving behind the innocence of childhood. Eva Hoffman spent her early years in Cracow, among family friends who, like her parents, had escaped the Holocaust and were skeptical of the newly imposed Communist state. Hoffman's parents managed to immigrate to Canada in the 1950s, where Eva was old enough to feel like a stranger--bland food, a quieter life, and schoolmates who hardly knew where Poland was. Still, there were neighbors who knew something of Old World ways, and a piano teacher who was classically Middle European in his neurotic enthusiasm for music. Her true exile came in college in Texas, where she found herself among people who were frightened by and hostile to her foreignness. Later, at Harvard, Hoffman found herself initially alienated by her burgeoning intellectualism; her parents found it difficult to comprehend. Her sense of perpetual otherness was extended by encounters with childhood friends who had escaped Cracow to grow up in Israel, rather than Canada or the United States, and were preoccupied with soldiers, not scholars. Lost in Translation is a moving memoir that takes the specific experience of the exile and humanizes it to such a degree that it becomes relevant to the lives of a wider group of readers. [via]
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Love Among the Walnutsby Jean FerrisISBN 0141310995 (0-14-131099-5)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Master Harold & the Boysby Athol FugardISBN 0140481877 (0-14-048187-7)
Softcover, Viking Pr
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Momoby Michael EndeISBN 0140079165 (0-14-007916-5)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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The Monk: A Longman Cultural Editionby Matthew Lewis, Christopher MacLachlanISBN 0140436030 (0-14-043603-0)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Monk: A Longman Cultural Edition'Book summary:[via]Few could sustain the glance of his eye, at once fiery and penetrating
Savaged by critics for its supposed profanity and obscenity, and bought in large numbers by readers eager to see whether it lived up to its lurid reputation, The Monk became a succès de scandale when it was published in 1796 not least because its author was a member of parliament and only twenty years old. It recounts the diabolical decline of Ambrosio, a Capuchin superior, who succumbs first to temptations offered by a young girl who has entered his monastery disguised as a boy, and continues his descent with increasingly depraved acts of sorcery, murder, incest and torture. Combining sensationalism with acute psychological insight, this masterpiece of Gothic fiction is a powerful exploration of how violent and erotic impulses can break through the barriers of social and moral restraint.
This edition is based on the first edition of 1796, which appeared before Lewiss revisions to avoid charges of blasphemy. In his introduction, Christopher MacLachlan discusses the novels place within the Gothic genre, and its themes of sexual desire and the abuse of power.
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The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucketby Edgar Allan Poe, Richard KopleyISBN 0140437487 (0-14-043748-7)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket'Book summary:This is an electronic edition of the complete book complemented by author biography. This book features the table of contents linked to every chapter. The book was designed for optimal navigation on the Kindle, PDA, Smartphone, and other electronic readers. It is formatted to display on all electronic devices including the Kindle, Smartphones and other Mobile Devices with a small display. ************ The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket is Edgar Allan Poe's only complete novel, published in 1838. The work relates the tale of the young Arthur Gordon Pym who stows away aboard a whaling ship called Grampus. Various adventures and misadventures befall Pym including shipwreck, mutiny and cannibalism. The story starts out as a fairly conventional adventure at sea, but it becomes increasingly strange and hard to classify in later chapters, involving religious symbolism and the Hollow Earth. - Excerpted from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. More e-Books from MobileReference - Best Books. Best Price. Best Search and Navigation (TM) All fiction books are only $0.99. All collections are only $5.99Designed for optimal navigation on Kindle and other electronic devices Search for any title: enter mobi (shortened MobileReference) and a keyword; for example: mobi ShakespeareTo view all books, click on the MobileReference link next to a book title Literary Classics: Over 10,000 complete works by Shakespeare, Jane Austen, Mark Twain, Conan Doyle, Jules Verne, Dickens, Tolstoy, and other authors. All books feature hyperlinked table of contents, footnotes, and author biography. Books are also available as collections, organized by an author. Collections simplify book access through categorical, alphabetical, and chronological indexes. They offer lower price, convenience of one-time download, and reduce clutter of titles in your digital library. [via]
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Northanger Abbeyby Jane Austen, Anne Henry EhrenpreisISBN 0140430741 (0-14-043074-1)
Softcover, Penguin USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Northanger Abbey'Book summary:Though Northanger Abbey is one of Jane Austen's earliest novels, it was not published until after her death--well after she'd established her reputation with works such as Pride and Prejudice, Emma, and Sense and Sensibility. Of all her novels, this one is the most explicitly literary in that it is primarily concerned with books and with readers. In it, Austen skewers the novelistic excesses of her day made popular in such 18th-century Gothic potboilers as Ann Radcliffe's The Mysteries of Udolpho. Decrepit castles, locked rooms, mysterious chests, cryptic notes, and tyrannical fathers all figure into Northanger Abbey, but with a decidedly satirical twist. Consider Austen's introduction of her heroine: we are told on the very first page that "no one who had ever seen Catherine Morland in her infancy, would have supposed her born to be an heroine." The author goes on to explain that Miss Morland's father is a clergyman with "a considerable independence, besides two good livings--and he was not in the least addicted to locking up his daughters." Furthermore, her mother does not die giving birth to her, and Catherine herself, far from engaging in "the more heroic enjoyments of infancy, nursing a dormouse, feeding a canary-bird, or watering a rose-bush" vastly prefers playing cricket with her brothers to any girlish pastimes.
Catherine grows up to be a passably pretty girl and is invited to spend a few weeks in Bath with a family friend. While there she meets Henry Tilney and his sister Eleanor, who invite her to visit their family estate, Northanger Abbey. Once there, Austen amuses herself and us as Catherine, a great reader of Gothic romances, allows her imagination to run wild, finding dreadful portents in the most wonderfully prosaic events. But Austen is after something more than mere parody; she uses her rapier wit to mock not only the essential silliness of "horrid" novels, but to expose the even more horrid workings of polite society, for nothing Catherine imagines could possibly rival the hypocrisy she experiences at the hands of her supposed friends. In many respects Northanger Abbey is the most lighthearted of Jane Austen's novels, yet at its core is a serious, unsentimental commentary on love and marriage, 19th-century British style. --Alix Wilber [via]
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Notes from Underground the Doubleby Fyodor DostoyevskyISBN 0140442529 (0-14-044252-9)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Notes from Underground the Double'Book summary:'It is best to do nothing! The best thing is conscious inertia! So long live the underground!' Alienated from society and paralysed by a sense of his own insignificance, the anonymous narrator of Dostoyevsky's groundbreaking Notes from Underground tells the story of his tortured life. With bitter sarcasm, he describes his refusal to become a worker in the 'ant-hill' of society and his gradual withdrawal to an existence 'underground'. The seemingly ordinary world of St Petersburg takes on a nightmarish quality in The Double when a government clerk encounters a man who exactly resembles him - his double perhaps, or possibly the darker side of his own personality. Like Notes from Underground, this is a masterly study of human consciousness. Jessie Coulson's introduction discusses the stories' critical reception and the themes they share with Dostoyevksy's great novels. @TweetsFromUndegrnd An officer pushed me at a bar. I will find this pizda son of a bitch and maybe murder him slowly. I'm a bit of a sociopath, aren't I? From Twitterature: The World's Greatest Books in Twenty Tweets or Less [via]
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Oliver, Amanda, and Grandmother Pigby Jean Van Leeuwen, Ann SchweningerISBN 0140373861 (0-14-037386-1)
Softcover, Puffin
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Phaedrus and Letters VII and VIIIby Plato, Walter HamiltonISBN 0140442758 (0-14-044275-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautifulby Edmund Burke, David WomersleyISBN 0140436251 (0-14-043625-1)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Plato Phaedrusby Plato, Christopher RoweISBN 0140449744 (0-14-044974-4)
Softcover, Penguin Classics
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Politicsby Aristotle, Trevor J. Saunders, T.A. SinclairISBN 0140444211 (0-14-044421-1)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Politics'Book summary:The Politics is one of the most influential texts in the history of political thought, and it raises issues which still confront anyone who wants to think seriously about the ways in which human societies are organized and governed. By examining the way societies are run--from households to city states--Aristotle establishes how successful constitutions can best be initiated and upheld.
For this edition, Sir Ernest Barker's fine translation, which has been widely used for nearly half a century, has been extensively revised to meet the needs of the modern reader. The accessible introduction and clear notes examine the historical and philosophical background of the work and discuss its significance for modern political thought.
About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more. [via] -
The Railway Childrenby E. Nesbit, C. E. BrockISBN 0140366717 (0-14-036671-7)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Railway Children'Book summary:When Father has to go away for a time, the three children and their mother leave their London house and go to live in a small house in the country. They seek solace in the nearby railway station, making friends with Perks the porter and with the station master himself. But the mystery remains: where is their father and is he ever going to return? [via]
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Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factoryby Roald DahlISBN 0140311254 (0-14-031125-4)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'Book summary:Roald Dahl's much-loved story about how Charlie Bucket wins a ticket to visit Willy Wonka's amazing chocolate factory is turned into a play for children to act. With tips about scenery, props and lighting, the play is easy to stage and there are lots of parts for everyone. Roald Dahl, the best-loved of children's writers, died in 1990 but his books continue to be bestsellers. Richard George was an elementary school teacher in New York when he wrote this stage adaptation of Roald Dahl's bestselling story - and Roald Dahl himself recommended that it should be published. [via]
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Roald Dahl's James and the Giant Peachby Richard R. GeorgeISBN 0140314644 (0-14-031464-4)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Roald Dahl's James and the Giant Peach'Book summary:Join James as he escapes from his horrible aunts and sets off inside the peach on his wonderful adventures. This dramatization of Roald Dahl's hugely popular book can be staged in school, acted out at home or simply read together by a group of friends. With suggestions for staging, props and lighting. Roald Dahl died in 1990 but his books continue to be worldwide bestsellers. Richard George was an American elementary school teacher when he adapted James and the Giant Peach as a school play. Roald Dahl loved it and wrote an introduction. [via]
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Roald Dahl's Revolting Rhymesby Roald Dahl, Quentin BlakeISBN 0140375333 (0-14-037533-3)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Roald Dahl's Revolting Rhymes'Book summary:Six of the best known fairy tales are retold, with some extremely surprising twists, by the master of the comic and the bloodcurdling--Roald Dahl. Includes Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Little Red Riding Hood, and The Three Little Pigs. Full color. [via]
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Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cryby Mildred D. TaylorISBN 014034893X (0-14-034893-X)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry'Book summary:In all Mildred D. Taylor's unforgettable novels she recounts "not only the joy of growing up in a large and supportive family, but my own feelings of being faced with segregation and bigotry." Her Newbery Medal-winning Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry tells the story of one African American family, fighting to stay together and strong in the face of brutal racist attacks, illness, poverty, and betrayal in the Deep South of the 1930s. Nine-year-old Cassie Logan, growing up protected by her loving family, has never had reason to suspect that any white person could consider her inferior or wish her harm. But during the course of one devastating year when her community begins to be ripped apart by angry night riders threatening African Americans, she and her three brothers come to understand why the land they own means so much to their Papa. "Look out there, Cassie girl. All that belongs to you. You ain't never had to live on nobody's place but your own and long as I live and the family survives, you'll never have to. That's important. You may not understand that now but one day you will. Then you'll see."
Twenty-five years after it was first published, this special anniversary edition of the classic strikes as deep and powerful a note as ever. Taylor's vivid portrayal of ugly racism and the poignancy of Cassie's bewilderment and gradual toughening against social injustice and the men and women who perpetuate it, will remain with readers forever. Two award-winning sequels, Let the Circle Be Unbroken and The Road to Memphis, and a long-awaited prequel, The Land, continue the profoundly moving tale of the Logan family. (Ages 9 and older) --Emilie Coulter [via]
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Ronald Morgan Goes to Batby Patricia Reilly Giff, Susanna NattiISBN 0140506691 (0-14-050669-1)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Selected Writings of Edgar Allan Poeby Edgar Allan PoeISBN 0140430288 (0-14-043028-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Sister Carrieby Theodore Dreiser, Neda M. Westlake, James L. W. WestISBN 0140188282 (0-14-018828-2)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Sister Carrie'Book summary:This edition of Dreiser's novel is the first publication of the entire, unexpurgated, uncensored text. It includes a preface and acknowledgements, the text of the novel, historical/critical commentary and accompanying notes. [via]
Snow Angels: A Novelby Stewart O'NanISBN 0140250964 (0-14-025096-4)
Softcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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Son of the Middle Borderby Hamlin Garland, Joseph B. McCulloughISBN 0140187960 (0-14-018796-0)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Speakby Laurie Halse AndersonISBN 014131088X (0-14-131088-X)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Speak'Book summary:Since the beginning of the school year, high school freshman Melinda has found that it's been getting harder and harder for her to speak out loud: "My throat is always sore, my lips raw.... Every time I try to talk to my parents or a teacher, I sputter or freeze.... It's like I have some kind of spastic laryngitis." What could have caused Melinda to suddenly fall mute? Could it be due to the fact that no one at school is speaking to her because she called the cops and got everyone busted at the seniors' big end-of-summer party? Or maybe it's because her parents' only form of communication is Post-It notes written on their way out the door to their nine-to-whenever jobs. While Melinda is bothered by these things, deep down she knows the real reason why she's been struck mute: Andy Evans. He's a senior at Melinda's high school, and Melinda hasn't been able to speak clearly since he raped her at the senior party last August.
Laurie Halse Anderson's first novel is a stunning and sympathetic tribute to the teenage outcast. The triumphant ending, in which Melinda finds her voice and loudly confronts her rapist, is cause for cheering (while many readers might also shed a tear or two). After reading Speak, it will be hard for any teen to look at the class scapegoat again without a measure of compassion and understanding for that person--who may be screaming beneath the silence. (Ages 13 and older) --Jennifer Hubert [via]
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Tales from the Thousand and One Nightsby N. J. DawoodISBN 0140442898 (0-14-044289-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Tales from the Thousand and One Nights'Book summary:The tales told by Shahrazad over a thousand and one nights to delay her execution by the vengeful King Shahriyar have become among the most popular in both Eastern and Western literature. From the epic adventures of "Aladdin and the Enchanted Lamp" to the farcical "Young Woman and her Five Lovers" and the social criticism of "The Tale of the Hunchback", the stories depict a fabulous world of all-powerful sorcerers, jinns imprisoned in bottles and enchanting princesses. But despite their imaginative extravagance, the Tales are anchored to everyday life by their realism, providing a full and intimate record of medieval Islam. [via]
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Theory of the Leisure Classby Thorstein VeblenISBN 0140187952 (0-14-018795-2)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Theory of the Leisure Class'Book summary:Classic sociology and economics, originally published in 1899, from "the best critic of America that America has produced."-C. Wright Mills. [via]
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Travels with Charley in Search of Americaby John Steinbeck, Jay PariniISBN 0140187413 (0-14-018741-3)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Travels with Charley in Search of America'Book summary:Today, nearly forty years after his death, Nobel Prize winner John Steinbeck remains one of America?s greatest writers and cultural figures. Over the next year, his many works published as black-spine Penguin Classics for the first time and will feature eye-catching, newly commissioned art.[via]Penguin Classics is proud to present these seminal works to a new generation of readers?and to the many who revisit them again and again."
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Twenty Years at Hull-House : With Autobiographical Notesby Jane Addams, Ruth Sidel, Norah HamiltonISBN 0141180994 (0-14-118099-4)
Softcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Twenty Years at Hull-House : With Autobiographical Notes'Book summary:While on a trip to East London in 1883, Jane Addams witnessed a distressing scene late one night: masses of poor people were bidding on rotten vegetables that were unsalable anywhere else.
Their pale faces were dominated by that most unlovely of human expressions, the cunning and shrewdness of the bargain-hunter who starves if he cannot make a successful trade, and yet the final impression was not of ragged, tawdry clothing nor of pinched and sallow faces, but of myriads of hands, empty, pathetic, nerveless, and workworn, showing white in the uncertain light of the street, and clutching forward for food which was already unfit to eat.
This scene haunted Addams for the next two years as she traveled through Europe, and she hoped to find a way to ease such suffering. Five years later, she visited Toynbee Hall, a London settlement house, and resolved to replicate the experiment in the U.S. On September 18, 1889, Jane Addams and her friend Ellen Starr moved into the second floor of a rundown mansion in Chicago's West Side. From the outset, they imagined Hull-House as a "center for a higher civic and social life" in the industrial districts of the city. Addams, Starr, and several like-minded individuals lived and worked among the poor, establishing (among other things) art classes, discussion groups, cooperatives, a kindergarten, a coffee house, a lending library, and a gymnasium. In a time when many well-to-do Americans were beginning to feel threatened by immigrants, Hull-House embraced them, showed them the true meaning of democracy, and served as a center for philanthropic efforts throughout Chicago.
Hull-House also provided an outlet for the energies of the first generation of female college graduates, who were educated for work yet prevented from doing it. In some respects, however, Addams's impressive work, often hailed by historians as "revolutionary," was nothing of the sort. She embraced the sexual stereotypes of her day, and, though she was clearly an independent woman, soothed public fears by acting primarily in the traditional roles of nurturer and caregiver. Hull-House was a rousing success, and it inspired others to follow in Addams's footsteps.
Though Twenty Years at Hull-House is meant to be an autobiography, it is Hull-House itself that stands in the spotlight. Addams devotes the first third of the book to her upbringing and influences, but the remainder focuses on the organization she built--and the benefits accruing to those who work with the poor as well as to the poor themselves. At times Addams's prose is difficult to follow, but her ideals and her actions are truly inspiring. A classic work of history--and a model for today's would-be philanthropists. --Sunny Delaney [via]
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The Undertakingby Thomas LynchISBN 0140276238 (0-14-027623-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Undertaking'Book summary:"...I had come to know that the undertaking that my father did had less to do with what was done to the dead and more to do with what the living did about the fact of life that people died," Thomas Lynch muses in his preface to The Undertaking. The same could be said for Lynch's book: ostensibly about death and its attendant rituals, The Undertaking is in the end about life. In each case, he writes, it is the one that gives meaning to the other. A funeral director in Milford, Michigan, Lynch is that strangest of hyphenates, a poet-undertaker, but according to Lynch, all poets share his occupation, "looking for meaning and voices in life and love and death." Looking for meaning takes him to all sorts of unexpected places, both real and imagined. He embalms the body of his own father, celebrates the rebuilt bridge to his town's old cemetery, takes issue with the Jessica Mitfords of this world, and envisages a "golfatorium," a combination golf course and cemetery that could restore joy to the last rites. In "Crapper," Lynch even contemplates the subtleties of the modern flush toilet and its relationship to the messy business of dying: "Just about the time we were bringing the making of water and the movement of bowels into the house, we were pushing the birthing and marriage and sickness and dying out." Death and fatherhood, death and friendship, death and faith and love and poetry--these are the concerns that power Lynch's undertaking. Throughout, Lynch pleads the case for our dead--who are, after all, still living through us--with an eloquence marked by equal parts whimsy, wit, and compassion. In the last essay, "Tract," he envisions almost wistfully the funeral he'd choose for himself, and then relinquishes that, too. Funerals, after all, are for the living. The dead, he reminds us, don't care. --Mary Park [via]
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Vanity Fairby John Carey, William Makepeace ThackeryISBN 0140437533 (0-14-043753-3)
Softcover, Penguin USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Vanity Fair'Book summary:This is Thackeray's rich and gloriously chaotic sketch of English society during the Napoleonic wars. At the centre of this picture is the scheming and disreputable Becky Sharp, one of Thackeray's greatest creations. The style here is fast-paced and comic, but the character of Dobbin and his unrequited love for Amelia bring depth and pathos to the novel. Dobbin, the unheroic hero, is Thackeray's realistic answer to the hero-worship of high romanticism. The novel stands as a landmark in the development of European Realism. [via]
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Vanity Fairby William Makepeace ThackeryISBN 0140430350 (0-14-043035-0)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Vanity Fair'Book summary:A rich and resplendent story of English society during the Napoleonic Wars. Edited with an introduction by J.I.M. Stewart. 814 pages including notes. [via]
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Wake up and Smell the Money: Fresh Starts at Any Age and Any Season of Your Lifeby Ginger Applegarth, Leslie Whitaker, Virginia ApplegarthISBN 0140288554 (0-14-028855-4)
Softcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Wake up and Smell the Money: Fresh Starts at Any Age and Any Season of Your Life'Book summary:"Are you taking a financial nap?" asks the author of the national bestseller The Money Diet, in her savvy and reassuring new guide to managing personal finances.
In Wake Up and Smell the Money, Ginger Applegarth draws on her years as a financial planner and media personality to guide readers through the often daunting money hurdles we face across the six seasons of our financial lives. Using real-life, sometimes humorous client examples and truly idiotproof charts and worksheets, Applegarth shows you how to:
stop worrying about the past and choose the right investment strategy to achieve wealth right now
save for retirement even if you also have to save for your children's college expenses
stop marital disputes over money using Ginger's "No Argument Plan" for couples
. . . and much more
Whether you're starting out or starting over, building up or scaling back, Wake Up and Smell the Money is the wake-up call you need to put your financial life on the front burner. [via]More editions of Wake up and Smell the Money: Fresh Starts at Any Age and Any Season of Your Life:
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The Wind in the Willowsby Kenneth GrahameISBN 0140366857 (0-14-036685-7)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Wind in the Willows'Book summary:"[Mole] thought his happiness was complete when, as he meandered aimlessly along, suddenly he stood by the edge of a full-fed river. Never in his life had he seen a river before--this sleek, sinuous, full-bodied animal, chasing and chuckling, gripping things with a gurgle and leaving them with a laugh, to fling itself on fresh playmates that shook themselves free, and were caught and held again." Such is the cautious, agreeable Mole's first introduction to the river and the Life Adventurous. Emerging from his home at Mole End one spring, his whole world changes when he hooks up with the good-natured, boat-loving Water Rat, the boastful Toad of Toad Hall, the society- hating Badger who lives in the frightening Wild Wood, and countless other mostly well-meaning creatures. Michael Hague's exquisitely detailed, breathtaking color illustrations on almost every generous spread--along with Kenneth Grahame's elegant, delightfully old-fashioned characterizations of the animals--make this book a wonderful read-aloud. Grahame's The Wind in the Willows has enchanted readers for four generations, and this lavishly illustrated gift edition is perhaps the finest around. (All ages, or 9 to 12) [via]
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The Winter of Our Discontentby John SteinbeckISBN 0140187537 (0-14-018753-7)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Winter of Our Discontent'Book summary:Steinbeck's story set in small-town New England early in the century. Its inhabitants include Ethan Hawley, to whom the rat-race beckons enticingly, Marullo, a razor-sharp Sicilian store owner, and Marge, a good-time girl, alluring in body, warped in soul. [via]
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Wizard of Earthseaby Ursula K. Le GuinISBN 0140304770 (0-14-030477-0)
Hardcover, Penguin
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Wizard of Earthsea'Book summary:Often compared to Tolkien's Middle-earth or Lewis's Narnia, Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea is a stunning fantasy world that grabs quickly at our hearts, pulling us deeply into its imaginary realms. Four books (A Wizard of Earthsea, The Tombs of Atuan, The Farthest Shore, and Tehanu) tell the whole Earthsea cycle--a tale about a reckless, awkward boy named Sparrowhawk who becomes a wizard's apprentice after the wizard reveals Sparrowhawk's true name. The boy comes to realize that his fate may be far more important than he ever dreamed possible. Le Guin challenges her readers to think about the power of language, how in the act of naming the world around us we actually create that world. Teens, especially, will be inspired by the way Le Guin allows her characters to evolve and grow into their own powers.
In this first book, A Wizard of Earthsea readers will witness Sparrowhawk's moving rite of passage--when he discovers his true name and becomes a young man. Great challenges await Sparrowhawk, including an almost deadly battle with a sinister creature, a monster that may be his own shadow. [via]
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The Woman in Whiteby Wilkie Collins, Trevor NunnISBN 0141020318 (0-14-102031-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Woman in White'Book summary:Like few novels before it, The Woman in White thrilled readers across England when it debuted in 1860. It famously opens with Walter Hartright's eerie encounter on a moonlit road. Engaged as a drawing-master to beautiful Laura Fairlie, Walter is drawn into the sinister intrigues of Sir Percival Glyde and his charming friend Count Fosco, who has a taste for white mice, vanilla bonbons, and poison. Pursuing questions of identity and insanity along the corridors of English country houses and the madhouse, The Woman in White is the first and most influential of the Victorian "sensation" novels, a phenomenon explored in detail in Matthew Sweet's new Introduction. This edition contains three appendices, which include a synopsis of the play Collins produced of his novel and its reception, as well as an account of the novel's composition. [via]
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