Classic Literature Anthology

Recently rediscovered in the archives of the New York Public Library, these short stories provide an unparalleled look at Truman Capote writing in his teens and early twenties, before he penned such classics as Other Voices, Other Rooms, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, and In Cold Blood. This collection of more than a dozen pieces showcases the young Capote developing the unique voice and sensibility that would make him one of the twentieth century’s most original writers.

Though The Arabian Nights are generally known as stories for children, they were originally tales for adults full of adventure, sexuality, violence, and the supernatural. They certainly inspired the imagination of Sir Richard Burton, the 19th century explorer, linguist, and erotologist who brought all his worldly experience and superbly expressive prose style to bear on the tales of Sindbad the Seaman and Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves.

Hot on the heels of Gardner Dozois's acclaimed anthology The Book of Swords comes this companion volume devoted to magic. How could it be otherwise? For every Frodo, there is a Gandalf... and a Saruman. For every Dorothy, a Glinda... and a Wicked Witch of the West. What would Harry Potter be without Albus Dumbledore... and Severus Snape? Figures of wisdom and power, possessing arcane, often forbidden knowledge, wizards and sorcerers are shaped - or misshaped - by the potent magic they seek to wield.

In the eight years since his first full-length novel, Gridlinked, was published by Pan Macmillan, Neal Asher has firmly established himself as one of the leading British writers of science fiction, and his novels are now translated in many languages. Most of his stories are set in a galactic future-scape called The Polity, and with this collection of marvellously inventive and action-packed short stories, he takes us further into the manifold diversities of that amazing universe.

This is Raymond Carver's third collection of stories, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, including the canonical titular story about blindness and learning to enter the very different world of another. The 12 stories in Cathedral mark a turning point in Carver's work.

The greatest short story writers strive to achieve a single, dramatic effect, a feature which the early masters of this genre perfected. Although the short story came from Europe, it was reborn in America and reached a pinnacle of superb form on these shores by the turn of the 20th century. In so many of our best writers, we hear echoes of a pioneer ethos that sustains the heart of a great literature. Here are 12 of America's best.

Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules is a collection of short stories, some classic, others impending, selected and introduced by David Sedaris.

Some of today's greatest storytellers reveal their choices of the ideal grown-up bedtime story: writers such as Margaret Drabble, Ken Follett, Tessa Hadley, Robert Macfarlane, Patrick Ness, Tony Robinson, and Warsan Shire. Fold away your laptop and shut down your mobile phone. Curl up and crash out with the ultimate bedside book, one you'll return to again and again. Full of laughter and tears, moonlight and magic, Bedtime Stories for Grown-ups joyfully provides the dream way to end the day - and begin the night....

Written initially in French, later translated by the author into English, Molloy is the first book in Dublin-born Samuel Beckett's trilogy. It was published shortly after WWII and marked a new, mature writing style, which was to dominate the remainder of his working life. Molloy is less a novel than a set of two monologues narrated by Molloy and his pursuer, Moran.

"Of the place where he had been a boy he had written well enough. As well as he could then." So thought a dying writer in an early version of The Snows of Kilimanjaro. The writer was, of course, Ernest Hemingway. The place was the Michigan of his boyhood, where he remembered himself as Nick Adams. The now-famous "Nick Adams" stories show a memorable character growing from child to adolescent to soldier, veteran, writer, and parent - a sequence closely paralleling the events of Hemingway's life.

The bloody-minded Montresor leads the pompous Fortunato deep into the catacombs, seeking the famed Amontillado wine. Here we have one of Poe’s most terrifying, and most “beloved” tales. Revenge and pomposity commingle beneath the river’s bed, leading to a delightfully sinister conclusion.

O. Henry, the pseudonym of the American writer William Sydney Porter (1862-1910), is best known for writing stories full of wit, wordplay, and warm characterizations, and particularly for their clever twist endings. This volume contains 20 of O. Henry's best and best-loved stories. They are marked by coincidence and surprise endings as well as the compassion and high humor that have made O. Henry's stories popular for the last century.

A second collection of horror/thriller stories with surprise endings to chill you and thrill you to the bone on Halloween. These nightmares are selections from the collections noted: HUMAN HEAD FOR SALE Mark purchases a human head on eBay to scare his guests at his annual Halloween Party. (Creepers 2) CARMEN A horror novelist employs a man-eating plant to eliminate his most offensive critic. (Creepers 10) CYCLOPS The freak show at the end of the fairgrounds is one Jed Norman will never forget. (Black As Night) DEVIL’S NIGHT The Blunt boys have never committed as malicious pranks on ...

Bons dias reúne crônicas narrativas do escritor Machado de Assis, considerado um dos autores mais importantes da literatura brasileira. Os textos, publicados entre 1888 e 1889, carregam um tom irônico e realista de uma época do Brasil em que a monarquia e a escravidão chegavam ao fim. As crônicas apresentam diversos personagens, entre eles, o próprio autor, que usa um pseudônimo de “Boas Noites”. Esta obra de Machado de Assis trata de variados assuntos no campo politico, cultural e social e aborda temas como os neologismos, a medicina popular e o espiritismo.

Herman Melville’s tale of corporate discontent, Bartleby, the Scrivener, tells the story of a quiet, hardworking legal copyist who works in an office in the Wall Street area of New York City. The business where he works handles the official financial paperwork of wealthy men. One day, Bartleby’s employer requests he proofread one of the documents he has copied. Bartleby declines the assignment with the inscrutable “I would prefer not,” the first of what will become many refusals.

Before he gained wide fame as a novelist, Ernest Hemingway established his literary reputation with his short stories. Set in the varied landscapes of Spain, Africa, and the Americam Midwest, this definitive audio collection traces the development and maturation of Hemingway's distinct and revolutionary storytelling style: from the plain bald language of the first story to his mastery of seamless prose that contained a spare, eloquent pathos, as well as a sense of expansive solitude.

Annie Proulx's masterful language and fierce love of Wyoming are evident in this collection of stories about loneliness, quick violence, and wrong kinds of love. In "The Mud Below", a rodeo rider's obsession marks the deepening fissures between his family life and self-imposed isolation. In "The Half-Skinned Steer", an elderly fool drives west to the ranch he grew up on for his brother's funeral, and dies a mile from home.

Stories of the miraculous abound in the Bible: the parting of the Red Sea. David and Goliath. Daniel and the Lion’s Den. Nebuchadnezzar’s Fiery Furnace. Jonah and the Whale. Many of us learned of them in Sunday School class, and might know them so well that we have subconsciously relegated them to the realm of myth and fairy tale. But have you ever considered what it might have been like to live through those incredible stories—without knowing how they end? These stories and more are brought to life in All Things Are Possible, told through the eyes of the main character.

A collection of twenty-eight horror/thriller stories with surprise endings to thrill you and chill you. The creepers include: JIMMY SAID IT WAS THE BOOGEYMAN: His mother and older brother have been brutally murdered, and Jimmy says the boogeyman did it. CREATURE FEATURE: Bruce agrees to have plastic surgery to become the star of a monster movie. VESPA: Kurt marries a beautiful woman who prefers to dress as a goth and live in a house suitable for the Munsters and The Addams Family. THE AMATEUR: A mild-mannered commuter suddenly has the overpowering desire to kill people and seeks help from a...

"To Build a Fire," the best-known of Jack London's many short stories, tells the tale of a solitary traveler on the Yukon Trail accompanied only by his dog as they endure the extreme cold. A classic narrative of a battle for survival against the forces of nature, "To Build a Fire" is London at his best. Also included here are "The Red One," "All Gold Canyon," "A Piece of Steak," "The Love of Life," "Flush of Gold," "The Story of Keesh," and "The Wisdom of the Trail."