Classic Science

From the moment Mary Poppins arrives at Number Seventeen Cherry-Tree Lane, everyday life at the Banks house is forever changed. Jane, Michael, and the twins have never had such a wonderful nanny, who brings enchantment and excitement everywhere she goes. In Mary Poppins Opens the Door, Mary Poppins reappears just in time! According to her tape measure, Jane and Michael have grown "Worse and Worse" since she went away.

December is the time of the annual Ceremony at which each twelve-year-old receives a life assignment determined by the Elders. Jonas watches his friend Fiona named Caretaker of the Old and his cheerful pal Asher labeled the Assistant Director of Recreation. But Jonas has been chosen for something special. When his selection leads him to an unnamed man, the man called only the Giver, he begins to sense the dark secrets that underlie the fragile perfection of his world.

One minute, down-and-out actor Lorenzo Smythe is, as usual, in a bar, drinking away his troubles while watching his career circle the drain. Then a space pilot buys him a drink, and the next thing Smythe knows, he’s shanghaied to Mars. Smythe suddenly finds himself agreeing to the most difficult role of his career: impersonating an important politician who has been kidnapped. Peace with the Martians is at stake, and failure to pull off the act could result in interplanetary war.

Unbeknownst to him, Ray is about to partake on an adventure filled with magical beasts, warring factions, and a leveling-up system out of this world. He'll encounter filthy bandits, musty crypts, and friendly werewolves. Oh, you heard us right. If only he wasn't given negative charisma points around women, he might have a chance, but you can't win them all.

For over two millennia in the West, familiarity with the literature, philosophy, and values of the Classical World has been synonymous with education itself. The traditions of the Greeks explain why Western Culture’s unique tenets of democracy, capitalism, civil liberty, and constitutional government are now sweeping the globe. Yet the general public in America knows less about its cultural origins than ever before, as Classical education rapidly disappears from our high school and university curricula.

Published in chronological order, with extensive story and bibliographic notes, this series not only provides access to stories that have been out of print for years, but gives them a historical and social context. Series editors Scott Conners and Ronald S. Hilger excavated the still-existing manuscripts, letters and various published versions of the stories, creating a definitive "preferred text" for Smith's entire body of work.

It should have been a case like any other: a missing princess, a king willing to pay in gold for her return. But before he realizes it, private investigator Eddie LaCrosse, a slightly shopworn sword jockey with a talent for discretion and detection, is swept up in a web of mystery and deceit involving a brutally murdered royal heir, a queen accused of an unspeakable crime, and the tragic past he thought he'd left behind.

The second Dune installment explores new developments on the planet Arrakis, with its intricate social order and strange, threatening environment. Dune Messiah picks up the story of the man known as Muad'Dib, heir to a power unimaginable, bringing to fruition an ambition of unparalleled scale: the centuries-old scheme to create a superbeing who reigns not in the heavens but among men. But the question is: DO all paths of glory lead to the grave?

One of the most significant books ever written by a head of state, the Meditations are a collection of philosophical thoughts by the Emperor Marcus Aurelius (121 - 180 ce). Covering issues such as duty, forgiveness, brotherhood, strength in adversity and the best way to approach life and death, the Meditations have inspired thinkers, poets and politicians since their first publication more than 500 years ago. Today, the book stands as one of the great guides and companions - a cornerstone of Western thought.

Joseph K. is an Everyman. His inconsequence makes doubly strange his arrest by an officer of the court, made with no formal charges or explanation. Disoriented and consumed with guilt for a "crime" he does not understand, Josef K. must justify his life to a "court" with which he cannot communicate. Through the court's relentless bureaucratic proceedings and absurd juxtapositions of different hypotheses of cause and effect, the whole rational structure of the world is undermined.

When Orwell went to England in the 30's to find out how industrial workers lived, he not only observed but shared in their experiences. He stayed in cramped, dreary lodgings and subsisted on the scant, cheerless diet of the poor. He went down into the coal mines and walked crouching, as the miners did, through a one- to three-mile passage too low to stand up in. He watched the back-breaking, dangerous labor of men whose net pay then averaged $575 a year.

Orphaned as a young child, Mirin O'Malley has been brought up by her grandparents on their isolated, rambling estate Hob's Hallow. Long ago her family prospered due to a deal struck with the mer, the terrifying creatures who live in the depths of the sea: safety for their merchant ships in return for a child of each generation. But for many years the family have been unable to keep their side of the bargain and their fortunes have suffered as a result. When Mirin's grandfather dies, her grandmother puts in train a plan to restore their glory - but at the price of Mirin's freedom.

When Sara and Jamie discovered the artifacts, they sensed the pull of a dim, distant place, a world of misty forests, ancient magics, mythical beings, ageless bards...and restless evil.

A war no one fully understands has devastated the planet with radioactive fallout from massive cobalt bombing. Melbourne, Australia, is the only area whose citizens have not yet succumbed to the contamination. But there isn’t much time left, a few months, maybe more—and the citizens of Melbourne must decide how they will live the remaining weeks of their lives, and how they will face a hopeless future.

The ads enthused, "The virtual lands of Mirror World await you! Live out your most secret dreams in our world of Sword and Sorcery! Become a Great Wizard or a Famous Warrior! Build your own castle, tame a dragon, conquer a kingdom! All those desperate, lonely, and insecure - Mirror World offers you a chance!" But Oleg isn't meant to become a great wizard or a famous warrior. He'll never have a castle of his own. Nor will he ever tame a dragon. And he's definitely not the type to conquer a kingdom, however virtual it may be.

Greg Wise reads Pierre Boulle's chilling, iconic novel about a nightmare world where apes rule over men. In a spaceship that can travel at the speed of light, Ulysse, a journalist, sets off from Earth for the nearest solar system. He finds there a planet which resembles his own, except that on Soror humans behave like animals and are hunted by a civilised race of primates.

Where do you go when you die? If you guessed "a hellish videogame world where you're forced to fight for your life, solve puzzles, and sustain mortal injury only to be stitched back together to do it again", congratulations! Maybe that sounds kind of bad. But hear me out. Superpowers. Beautiful women at my side, some human and some decidedly not so much. And maybe, just maybe, if I survive long enough, I can find out what comes after the afterlife.

Enter the fantastical world of Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast Trilogy, one of the undisputed fantasy classics of all time. Novelist C.S. Lewis called Peake's books "actual additions to life; they give, like certain rare dreams, sensations we never had before, and enlarge our conception of the range of possible experience."

Wynne might have been human once. It's hard to say. Now he's a bunker core, a nanomachine controller responsible for an entire complex. Of course, the place is a bit wrecked. And the world outside is in ruins. And he's pretty sure that whoever put him here is going to come looking for him at some point....

Winston Smith works in the Ministry of Truth—or Minitrue as it is called in Newspeak—where he alters newspapers and reports to follow the arbitrary dictates of Big Brother’s propaganda. Beneath his outward conformity, however, Winston dreams of sharing his treasonable thoughts and breaking through the loneliness in which he lives. Thus he takes his first dangerous steps, writing a diary of his doubts and then falling in love with a woman of the Party, the beautiful and brave Julia.