Out of Time’s Abyss is an Edgar Rice Burroughs science fiction novel, the third of his Caspak trilogy. The sequence was first published in Blue Book Magazine as a three-part serial in the issues for September, October and November 1918, with Out of Time's Abyss forming the third installment. The complete trilogy was later combined for publication in book form under the title of The Land That Time Forgot (properly speaking the title of the first part) by A. C. McClurg in June 1924.
"Brazilian Tales" is a collection of six short stories selected by Isaac Goldberg as best representative of the Brazilian Literature of his period - the end of the 19th century. His comprehensive preface aims at familiarizing the reader with a literature that was - and still is - virtually unknown outside the boundaries of its own land, and the pieces chosen by Goldberg to be translated belong to writers that reached popularity and appreciation while still alive. This "pioneer volume", as the translator himself puts it, still keeps its charm and interest as a way of offering to the English speaking public some "sample cases" of Brazilian Literature.
Pemberton, a young American with an Oxford education and out of money, takes a job tutoring Morgan Moreen, the 12-year old son of an American couple living in Europe in a style not quite matched by their income. Mr. and Mrs. Moreen's main purpose in life, it appears, is to win acceptance in the higher circles of French and Italian society, partly in the hope that Morgan's two elder sisters will be taken off their hands. Morgan, who is highly intelligent, is also precocious and perceptive enough to come to understand his parents' ambitious aimlessness. Something of a crisis develops when the Moreens fail to make good on the salary they've promised Pemberton, and he leaves, needing a steady income. By then, however, the tutor has become sufficiently interested in and attached to his charge to be unwilling to leave Morgan for long, and comes back to join the family when when Morgan's mother tells him the boy has fallen ill. There, however, he finds the family shipwreck that he has feared is now taking place, and he is in time to witness it.
Fenris isn't a hell planet, but it's nobody's bargain. With 2,000-hour days and an 8,000-hour year, it alternates blazing heat with killing cold. A planet like that tends to breed a special kind of person: tough enough to stay alive and smart enough to make the best of it. When that kind of person discovers he's being cheated of wealth he's risked his life for, that kind of planet is ripe for revolution. (Introduction from the Gutenberg text)
"Well, Robin, on what folly do you employ yourself? Do you cut sticks for our fire o' mornings?" Thus spoke Master Hugh Fitzooth, King's Ranger of the Forest at Locksley, as he entered his house.
Robin flushed a little. "These are arrows, sir," he announced, holding one up for inspection.
Dame Fitzooth smiled upon the boy as she rose to meet her lord. "What fortune do you bring us to-day, father?" asked she, cheerily.
Fitzooth's face was a mask of discontent. "I bring myself, dame," answered he, "neither more nor less."
"Surely that is enough for Robin and me!" laughed his wife. "Come, cast off your shoes, and give me your bow and quiver. I have news for you, Hugh, even if you have none for us. George of Gamewell has sent his messenger to-day, and bids me bring Robin to him for the Fair." She hesitated to give the whole truth.
Max Carrados is a blind detective who has developed his own remaining senses to a superior level and who has enlisted the superior observations skills of his butler to fill in for any deficiency of his own. His visual deficiency is no obstacle to solving the most difficult cases. As with some better known sleuths, Mr. Carrados' feats amaze, entertain and satisfy.
The star Mira was unpredictably variable. Sometimes it was blazing, brilliant and hot. Other times it was oddly dim, cool, shedding little warmth on its many planets. Gresth Gkae, leader of the Mirans, was seeking a better star, one to which his "people" could migrate. That star had to be steady, reliable, with a good planetary system. And in his astronomical searching, he found Sol.
With hundreds of ships, each larger than whole Terrestrial spaceports, and traveling faster than the speed of light, the Mirans set out to move in to Solar regions and take over.
And on Earth there was nothing which would be capable of beating off this incredible armada—until Buck Kendall stumbled upon THE ULTIMATE WEAPON.
A Victorian novel devoted to beloved character first introduced to readers in MacDonald's David Elginbrod.
Richard Hunter, formerly Ragged Dick, continues to advance in the world through luck and excellent morals. He, along with his friend Henry, moves into a better boarding house and then finds a promising job. He is framed for theft by a jealous co-worker and ends up in jail. He is exonerated, given his job back, and then is promoted. He eventually works his way up the ladder and becomes quite successful. (Written by Alys Attewater and Barry Eads)
A Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, Alice Adams chronicles the attempts of a lower middle class American midwestern family at the turn of the 20th century to climb the social ladder. The eponymous heroine is at the heart of the story, a young woman who wants a better place in society and a better life. As Gerard Previn Meyer has stated, "Apart from being the contribution to social history its author conceived it to be, [Alice Adams] is something more, that something being what has attracted to it so large a public: its portrait of a (despite her faults) 'lovable girl'."
The Wit and Humor of America is a 10 volume series. In this, the sixth volume, 55 short stories and poems have been gathered from 42 authors. This volume is sure to delight listeners.
The story is set in London, at an elite gentleman’s club called "The Grill," where an American gentleman arrests the attention of four other men by relating how one night he got lost in a thick London fog. He stumbled upon a house where a double murder was just committed. The victims of the murder were a young nobleman and a Russian princess. He escaped from the house and reported the killings to Scotland Yard. But they were unable to find the location of the dwelling. All very strange, as three of the other gentlemen all offer more information and perspectives on various details of the incident as they endeavor to solve the mystery.
Volunteers bring you 12 recordings of Casey at the Bat by Ernst Lawrence Thayer. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for December 16, 2012.
Ernst Thayer was an American writer and poet who wrote "Casey at the Bat", the "single most famous baseball poem ever written" according to the Baseball Almanac.
Arthur Kipps, an orphaned draper’s assistant of humble means, unexpectedly inherits a large sum of money and that is when all his troubles begin. Wanting to marry above his social class, he has to learn how to lead a genteel life, but that is too much for him. You would think that his decision to revert to Ann, his boyhood love, would solve his problems and bring him back to earth and contentment. But even now the consequences of being wealthy are not easy to live with.
A poignant tale about ambition and social class in England in the early 20th century by H.G. Wells, a master of this genre, who drew on features of his own life to provide some of the material
An Apology for the Life of Mrs. Shamela Andrews, or simply Shamela, as it is more commonly known, is a satirical novel written by Henry Fielding and first published in April 1741 under the name of Mr. Conny Keyber. Fielding never owned to writing the work, but it is widely considered to be his. It is a direct attack on the then-popular novel Pamela (November 1740) by Fielding's contemporary and rival Samuel Richardson and is composed, like Pamela, in epistolary form. Shamela is written as a shocking revelation of the true events which took place in the life of Pamela Andrews, the main heroine of Pamela. From Shamela we learn that, instead of being a kind, humble, and chaste servant-girl, Pamela (whose true name turns out to be Shamela) is in fact a wicked and lascivious creature, scheming to entrap her master, Squire Booby, into marriage.
Three men down on their luck in Tahiti agree to ship out on a vessel whose officers have died of smallpox. Their desperate venture inspires them to a further idea: they will steal the schooner and its cargo of champagne, sell them, and live a plentiful life. The thought is intoxicating... and so is the cargo, which they sample. Inattention nearly brings them to grief in a sudden storm. This sobering experience is followed by another - apparently the dead officers had a similar ambition! - and their dreams of riches vanish.
Then, nearly out of provisions and deep in the heart of the Pacific where the chart shows no land - they happen on a small isle only hinted at in the records and never mapped. Saved! But what is this? The island hides a pearl fishery?
In the ebb-tide of fortune, what new villainy will the three attempt?
Young Elizabeth, left orphaned by an evildoer who murders her last brother, flees Montana on horseback to find her remaining relatives in the East. Her social and spiritual journey leads her through harrowing encounters, struggles between good and evil, romance and, ultimately, love and fortune. Classic Grace Livingston Hill.
The Damnation of Theron Ware (published in England as Illumination) is an 1896 novel by American author Harold Frederic. It is widely considered a classic of American realism. The novel reveals a great deal about turn-of-the-century provincial America, religious life, and the depressed state of intellectual and artistic culture in small towns.
The novel centers on the life of a Methodist pastor named Theron Ware who has recently moved to a fictional small town in the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York, which Frederic modeled after Utica, New York. A promising young pastor recently married, Theron has a number of experiences that cause him to begin to question the Methodist religion, his role as a priest and even the very existence of God. His moral decline (or illumination) is heightened through his dealings with Father Forbes, the town's Catholic priest; Dr. Ledsmar, a local atheist, philosopher, and man of science; and Celia, a local Irish Catholic girl, a species of aesthete, with whom Theron becomes hopelessly infatuated.
"This novel is written by the author of, among other novels, the Stories of Sherlock Holmes. It is narrated by John Fothergill West, who tries to discover why the tenant of Cloomber Hall, General Heatherstone, is nervous to the point of being paranoid. Why are his fears becoming stronger every year at the fifth of October? And why doesn't he let his children leave home? This is a great mystery novel with a sharp twist at the end."
This novel won the Newbery Medal for excellence in American children's literature in 1964. This delightful story revolves around a 14 year old boy, Dave and his adopted cat, called just "Cat", who turns his ordinary everyday life into an exciting roller-coaster ride.
The story is set in 13th century England and concerns the fictitious outlaw Norman of Torn, who purportedly harried the country during the power struggle between King Henry III and Simon de Montfort. Norman is the supposed son of the Frenchman de Vac, once the king's fencing master, who has a grudge against his former employer and raises the boy to be a simple, brutal killing machine with a hatred of all things English. His intentions are partially subverted by a priest who befriends Norman and teaches him his letters and chivalry towards women.
Otherwise, all goes according to plan. By 17, Norman is the best swordsman in all of England; by the age of 18, he has a large bounty on his head, and by the age of 19, he leads the largest band of thieves in all of England. None can catch or best him. In his hatred for the king he even becomes involved in the civil war, which turns the tide in favor of de Montfort. In another guise, that of Roger de Conde, he becomes involved with de Montfort's daughter Bertrade, defending her against her and her father's enemies. She notes in him a curious resemblance to the king's son and heir Prince Edward.
Finally brought to bay in a confrontation with both King Henry and de Montfort, Norman is brought down by the treachery of de Vac, who appears to kill him, though at the cost of his own life. As de Vac dies, he reveals that Norman is in fact Richard, long-lost son of King Henry and Queen Eleanor and brother to Prince Edward. The fencing master had kidnapped the prince as a child to serve as the vehicle of his vengeance against the king. Luckily, Norman/Richard turns out not to be truly dead, surviving to be reconciled to his true father and attain the hand of Bertrade
As the title reveals, these stories are a collection of some of Mark Twain's more fanciful and eccentric works. They run the gamut from political commentary to our species' need to "be remembered" somehow. Taken as a whole the stories are "whimsical". Taken individually, they speak the truth in different ways.
One of Dickens' Christmas stories, this was first published as part of the Christmas number of Household Words for 1854. The first chapter relates Dickens' visit to the ancient Richard Watts's Charity at Rochester. The second chapter is the touching story of "Richard Doubledick", which Dickens supposedly told the travellers, and Dickens' journey home on Christmas morning provides the short concluding chapter.
'The Well-Beloved' tells the story of Jocelyn Pierston and his love for three generations of women - the grandmother, her daughter and grand-daughter over a period of forty years. Pierston is seeking for perfection in his choice of lover and in doing so lets opportunities for happiness pass him by. However, at the end of his life, he finds some kind of contentment in compromise.
Burmese Commisioner Nayland Smith and his faithful friend Dr Petrie continue their fight against the evil genius of Dr Fu-Manchu when they seek to save the good doctor's lost love and protect the British Empire from disaster when their malignant enemy returns to England.
Harrington Strong was a pseudonym used by author Johnston McCulley, creator of the character Zorro and many others. The Brand of Silence - A Detective Story finds Sidney Prale returning to New York after ten years during which he sought his fortune. But he finds New York a very changed place, and even more distressing, he finds that his old friends are now turning their backs on him, his old haunts no longer welcome him, and there seems to be a conspiracy against him.
Why can't he receive service in hotels, restaurants, and theaters that he once frequented? Who is working against him? And just as importantly, why? And what is the meaning of the notes he receives which remind him of "retribution"?
In this short novel of 1894, Conan Doyle describes a character with seemingly extraordinary powers. Are these powers occult or are they only in the minds of other people? There is no Sherlock Holmes to solve this mystery.
The novel begins in the 1790s in the coastal town of Monkshaven. Sylvia Robson lives with her parents on a farm, and is loved by her rather dull Quaker cousin Philip. She, however, meets and falls in love with Charlie Kinraid, a sailor on a whaling vessel, and they become engaged, although few people know of the engagement. But Charlie gets press-ganged and has to leave without a word...
A Tale of Youth and Summer Time and the Baxter Family Especially William
“Bunner Sisters,” like “The Age of Innocence” is set in 1870s New York, however the lives of Ann Eliza and Evelina Bunner reflect impoverished New York. The sisters run a "very small shop, in a shabby basement, in a sidestreet already doomed to decline." Shabby as it is, the sisters are happy in their small orderly community of supportive women. The story tells of the destruction of this life, and how the once content sisters are thrown into the realistic world outside of their little shop.
A stranger and foreigner arrives at the offices of a small publication in London only to be faced by the “editor” whose face is completely swathed in a veil. Nothing is as it seems, and it quickly becomes evident that both are bent on more than lively gossip about the elite. Blackmail and opportunism is the order of the day. When two men are found shot to death outside the door of Mr. Farrington the millionaire who just happens to live a few doors from T. B. Smith, the head of the secret police, the connections to blackmail are not long in coming. Were these men shot by the blackmailer? Who is actually what he seems to be?
A tale of cattle duffing, horse stealing and bushranging in the New South Wales outback with Captain Starlight.
To quote the author "though presented in the guise of fiction, this chronicle of the Marston family must not be set down by the reader as wholly fanciful or exaggerated. Much of the narrative is literally true, as can be verified by official records. A lifelong residence in Australia may be accepted as a guarantee for fidelity as to local colour and descriptive detail."
The Frozen Deep is a story of a love triangle between Clara, Frank and Richard, spiced up with dangerous expeditions, mysterious visions and life-threatening circumstances. The end is as surprising and unexpected as we are (or are not) accustomed to in Collins' books.
Under the Andes was written by Rex Stout years before his creation of the immensely popular Nero Wolfe series of novels, and while perhaps his future writing style is still blossoming, certainly his knack for weaving a fantastic tale of mystery and adventure will have most readers anxious for the next phase of adventure at every turn.
The story finds two brothers and a pretty female companion on a journey which eventually takes them to a series of underground caves under the Andes of South America, where they encounter a lost tribe of Incas who have apparently survived hundreds of years oblivious of the outside world. The apparent 'king' of the tribe has become infatuated with the fair-skinned female intruder of the group and, well, suffice it to say there's a lot of action, attempted escapes, heroism, and peculiar interactions between all, reminiscent of H. Rider Haggard with a touch of Edgar Rice Burroughs.
A story of psychological horror, The Return explores ideas of identity, love, and alienation. Arthur grapples with the reactions of his family and community, and his own sanity, when he experiences a sudden and mysterious "transformation".
The Wit and Humor of America is a 10 volume series. In this, the second volume, 44 short stories and poems have been gathered from 31 authors. This volume is sure to delight listeners.
A team of space travelers are caught in a subspace accident which, up to now, no one has ever survived. But some of the survivors of the Procyon are not ordinary travelers. Their psi abilities allow them to see things before they happen. But will it be enough?
Smith's story "Subspace Survivors" first appeared in the July 1960 issue of the magazine Astounding.
These 18 wonderful short stories by Eleanor H. Porter, the author of Pollyanna, deal with those marvelous and maddeningly frustrating creatures: human beings. As always, Porter describes real people with sensitivity and an insight into all of their variety that makes you say "I knew someone just like that". She is able to capture the faded, but not quite extinguished, dreams of the elderly and the bright hopes of youth. The theme of this collection is how we humans deal with life and love throughout our lives, "Across the Years", no matter where we are or what era we live in.
Bruno and Waldo Gillespie are orphaned brothers living with the extremely eccentric Professor Phaeton Featherwit. One day they set off in one of the professor's machines to investigate a tornado at close range and accidentally get sucked into it! They are then transported by the tornado and find themselves in a barren, uncharted wasteland wherein lies a city-- a long lost Aztec city! Find out what happens next to the brothers and the professor in this harrowing and exhilarating adventure! Description by Kehinde
An unidentified space ship lands in a Colorado lake. Equipped with a paralyzing ray weapon, the creatures begin taking human prisoners. A loan land surveyor and a journalist are trapped inside the Army cordon, which is helpless against the mysterious enemy. Can they stop the aliens before it is too late?
Not until after his death in 1918 was it revealed that Henry Adams was the anonymous author of Democracy, which had been published to great acclaim in 1880. Though the book avoids dates and the characters are fictitious, the setting is no doubt that of Washington in the 1870s, the age of Presidents Grant and Hayes. The young widow, Madeleine Lee, wealthy and independent, is the protagonist, who leaves her New York for Washington to turn her intelligence to politics and to see what makes her country tick. There she meets (among others) Senator Silas P. Ratcliffe of Illinois, one of the most powerful and influential (if somewhat uncultured) men of the capital, who is considering a run for the presidency, and who needs a wife to act as First Lady, a position that (he thinks) Mrs. Lee would admirably fill.
Through the book Adams plays with the themes of political necessity, compromise, corruption -- particularly the kind of corporate domination of national politics that he saw becoming all too powerful. Should honest and intelligent men keep their integrity by avoiding politics? Or would that simply mean turning over the governance of the country to power-hungry, scheming, and none too honest hacks? For all the witty conversations in his novel, this was a theme that plagued Adams (a presidential grandson) in life as well as literature, and it is a theme that has by no means disappeared today.
A young idealistic civil servant, Arvid Falk, leaves the drudgery of bureaucracy to become a journalist and author. As he explores various social activities — politics, publishing, theatre, philanthropy, and business — he finds more hypocrisy and corruption than he thought possible. He takes refuge with a group of "bohemians", who meet in a red dining room in Berns Salonger to discuss these matters. (Introduction adopted from Wikipedia)
James is the king's gardener and he deeply enjoys caring for and cultivating flowers. He teaches his daughter Mary many principles of godliness through the flowers. One day Mary is falsely accused of stealing, and the penalty is death. Through many trials and hardships, Mary learns of the goodness of God, the blessing of praying for her enemies, how to consider her trials as a joy, and true forgiveness.
Honath the Pursemaker is a heretic. He doesn’t believe the stories in the Book of Laws which claims giants created his tree-dwelling race. He makes his opinion known and is banished with his infidel friends to the floor of the jungle where dangers abound. Perhaps he’ll find some truth down there. – The Thing in the Attic is one of Blish’s Pantropy tales and was first published in the July, 1954 edition of If, Worlds of Science Fiction magazine.
Athelstan King is a British Secret Agent stationed in India at the beginning of WWI. He is attached to the Khyber Rifles regiment as a cover, but his real job is to prevent a holy war. "To stop a holy war single-handed would be rather like stopping the wind--possibly easy enough, if one knew the way." King is ordered to work with a mysterious and powerful Eastern woman, Yasmini. Can King afford to trust her? Can he afford not to? Introduction by Brett W. Downey
A few years before the great Civil War, a young English woman and her father, having left the security of their wagon train, are lost in the unforgiving Californian desert, looking in vain for the landmark that marks the short-cut across those last western mountains which would lead them to the home of an old friend. George Castlewood gives all the water and rations he has to his daughter, Erema, and dies just a short distance from help. Rescued by kind Sampson “Uncle Sam” Gundry, the family friend they had been seeking, Erema lives for a time at his saw mill. One day, one Mr. Goad, a bounty-hunter from England, arrives at the mill, offering $10,000 for proof of Lord Castlewood’s death and custody of his young daughter. Lord Castlewood had been accused of the crime of patricide 15 years earlier, escaped from jail and been on the lam ever since. Erema, believing her father’s innocence and determined to clear his good name, returns to England to discover the long-lost secrets of her family and the cloudy circumstances of the murder of her grandfather.
Told by Erema herself, this is a grand story of mystery and the coming of age of an independent and courageous woman. Set in Victorian England and the throes of the Civil War, the story is replete with twists and turns of plot in every chapter.
When Patty Went to College is Jean Webster's first novel, published in 1903. It is a humorous look at life in an all-girls college at the turn of the 20th century. Patty Wyatt, the protagonist of this story is a bright, fun loving, imperturbable girl who does not like to conform. The book describes her many escapades on campus during her senior year at college. Patty enjoys life on campus and uses her energies in playing pranks and for the entertainment of herself and her friends. An intelligent girl, she uses creative methods to study only as much as she feels necessary. Patty is, however, a believer in causes and a champion of the weak. She goes out of her way to help a homesick freshman Olivia Copeland who believes she will be sent home when she fails four subjects in the examination.
The Seventh Man by Max Brand, tells part of the story of the larger-than-life western character, Dan Barry, known as “Whistling Dan,” and his alter-ego companions, Black Bart, the wolf-dog, and Satan, the indomitable black stallion. It’s also the story of Kate Cumberland and the incredible five-year-old daughter of Kate and Dan, Joan. We first see Dan as a gentle, caring man with a deep sense of fairness. But then, after six years of a peaceful life in their mountain cabin Dan, more feral than human, sets out to revenge an injustice by killing seven men. Ultimately, it is his devotion to his daughter and Kate’s love for the child that brings about the climax of the tale.
Warning: don’t look for a typical cowboy story here – it’s far deeper and stronger than that.
It is 30,000 years following dramatically changed climate conditions on earth which had let massive amounts of carbon dioxide belch from the interior of the planet into the atmosphere. Over the millenia this would have quite devastating effects on life as it had once been known. Much of the human and animal population would not survive the climate change, and indeed those few humans who did survive knew nothing of all which their predecessors had learned and built. Indeed, they knew not even of their existence. On the other hand insects and fungi would flourish over time.
And so those few remaining humans were unknowingly at the very beginning of the building of a tribal society, which at the time of the story of Burl simply meant food and survival. And so it was Burl who chose to travel beyond his small tribal community in an effort to hunt for something new and different to hopefully impress Saya, the young female of his tribe to whom he felt a peculiar attraction. The Mad Planet is Burl's adventure.
The Wit and Humor of America is a 10 volume series. In this, the third volume, 45 short stories and poems have been gathered from 33 authors. This volume is sure to delight listeners.