Family Life Classics

Paddington Bear always manages to find himself in tricky situations, sometimes extraordinary situations. Like the time he had a difficult encounter with a policeman or when he found himself in deep water with a newspaper reporter. But since arriving from his native Peru after an earthquake Paddington has always felt at home with the Brown family who found him on Paddington station.

Lida Fisher knows that her beloved husband, Quincy, will die soon as the result of a rare and terrible brain rejection syndrome. But there is one hope. If Quincy consents to switch brains with one of the alien beings that have arrived from the other side of the galaxy, he will live on - albeit in the body of a starfish. And that means Lida must agree to let a new man into her life and her bed, one with the face and body of her adored husband but with the mind of an alien stranger.

A young man discovers a Dark ritual, he believes will reanimate the dead, and through the aide of natural and preternatural forces, his deeds end in horror.

One of the great novels of 19th-century France, Flaubert draws a deeply-felt but sympathetic portrait of a woman who, having warned a country doctor and found herself unhappy with a rural, genteel existence, longs for love and excitement. Her aspirations and her desires lead her into a tragic spiral downwards.

Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow was born on 22nd April 1873, in Richmond, Virginia. She published her first novel ‘The Descendant’ anonymously in 1897, at age 24. In 1923 came her short story collection ‘The Shadowy Third & Other Stories’, which included ‘The Difference’, a classic tale of a marriage hitting a problem and the moral and realistic reaction to that. Further works followed and, in 1941, she published ‘In This Our Life’.

Il più importante romanzo verista della letteratura italiana, un capolavoro senza pari che racconta la storia di una famiglia di pescatori di Aci Trezza, paesino nei pressi di Catania, all'indomani dell'Unità d'Italia.

Dopo aver perso il padre in quello che ha tutta l'aria di essere stato un doppio suicidio d'amore, Yoshie si trasferisce dalla sua casa di Meguro a un minuscolo e vecchio appartamento a Shimokitazawa, un quartiere di Tokyo famoso per le sue stradine chiuse al traffico, i ristoranti, i negozietti, nonché meta degli alternativi della capitale. Qui Yoshie spera, aiutata dall'atmosfera vivace, di superare il dolore e dare una nuova direzione alla sua vita. Un giorno, però, sua madre le si presenta a casa all'improvviso con una borsa Birkin di Hermès e qualche sacchetto.

Vor dem Hintergrund des aufkommenden Faschismus in Italien entfaltet Franz Werfel die Familiengeschichte eines Witwers mit 6 Kindern. Die Diktatur des "pater familias" altrömischer Schule lässt den Kindern kaum die Luft zum Atmen. Doch das Schicksal erbarmt sich. Die dramatischen Ereignisse überschlagen sich und bringen den Patriarchen durch schwere Schicksalsschläge zu später Einsicht. Neapolitanisches Lokalkolorit und liebevoll gezeichnete Charaktere machen diesen Roman, bei dem auch eine Prise Humor nicht fehlt, zu einem ungetrübten Hörvergnügen.

Pubblicato a Zurigo nel 1880, Heidi è un tipico romanzo di formazione la cui protagonista, rimasta orfana in tenera età, viene affidata da una zia alle cure del nonno paterno, il burbero e misantropo Zio dell'Alpe che si è ritirato a vivere in una baita alpina. Tra le alpi svizzere la bambina cresce libera e spensierata fino al giorno in cui la zia viene a riprenderla per affidarla ad una ricca famiglia di Francoforte la cui figlia, Clara, è immobilizzata su di una sedia a rotelle. Le bambine diventano subito molto amiche.

Lilli ist jung und bildhübsch, als sie im Sommer ihre Tante besucht. Im burgähnlichen Nachbarhaus wohnt ein geheimnisvoller junger Mann, Blaubart genannt. Es geht das Gerücht, er hielte eine Frau in seinem Turmzimmer gefangen. Lillis Neugier lässt sie dem Blaubart trotz strengsten Verbots begegnen. Zwischen den beiden entspinnt sich eine zarte Liebesgeschichte, während der ein uraltes Familiengeheimnis gelüftet wird. Mit seiner sonoren Stimme liest Heikko Deutschmann die Novelle der Thüringerin Eugenie Marlitt, die im 19. Jahrhundert zur ersten Bestsellerautorin der Welt aufstieg.

Set at the outbreak of World War II, Lady Sophia Garfield dreams of becoming a beautiful spy but manages not to notice a nest of German agents right under her nose. Until the murder of her maid and the kidnapping of her beloved bulldog force them on her attention, with heroic and absurd results. One of Mitford's earliest novels and written before Christmas 1939, Pigeon Pie is delivered with a touch lighter than that of her later masterpieces but no less entertaining. This comedy combines glamour, wit and a fiendishly absurd plot into an irresistible literary confection.

Uno dei grandi romanzi di Dickens, scritto tra il 1855 e il 1857, pubblicato in fascicoli mensili Esso è diviso in due libri: Povertà, in cui si parla delle misere condizioni della famiglia Dorrit, la cui madre è morta e il padre è in carcere per debiti, e della bontà della piccola Amy; compare inoltre tutta una folla di piccoli personaggi, seconda la tradizione di Dickens, che si ritroveranno poi nel corso di tutto il libro.

Martine prend ses premières leçons de natation : la planche, la brasse, le plongeon... Un vrai petit poisson dans l’eau ! La pétillante Mélodie Le Blay s’empare avec bonheur des histoires de Martine, pour le plus grand plaisir des petits curieux !

Maggie Tulliver has two lovers: Philip Wakem, son of her father's enemy; and Stephen Guest, already promised to her cousin; but the love she wants most in the world is that of her brother Tom. Maggie's struggle against her passionate and sensual nature leads her to a deeper understanding and to eventual tragedy.

This short novel follows the fate of Sissy Jupe, a warm-hearted circus child, and the family that adopts her. Deserted by her ailing father, Sissy is taken into the cold household of the Gradgrind family, which operates a school. The "eminently practical" Thomas Gradgrind believes only in facts and figures and has raised his children accordingly, thoroughly suppressing the imaginative side of their nature, and the consequences are devastating.

It is wartime and Carrie and her little brother Nick have been evacuated from their London home to the Welsh hills. In an unfamiliar place, among strangers, the children feel alone and find little comfort with the family they are billeted with: Mr Evans, a bullying shopkeeper and Auntie Lou, his kind but timid sister. When Carrie and Nick visit Albert, another evacuee, they are welcomed into Hepzibah Green's warm kitchen. Hepzibah is rumoured to be a witch, but her cooking is delicious, her stories are enthralling and the children cannot keep away.

"Alle glücklichen Familien ähneln einander, jede unglückliche Familie ist auf ihre Weise unglücklich." Dieser Anfangssatz aus "Anna Karenina" ist eines der bekanntesten Zitate von Tolstoi und lässt schon erahnen, dass die Ehe zwischen Mann und Frau eines seiner Lebensthemen war. In "Familienglück", gelesen von Gustl Halenke, heiratet ein Gutsbesitzer die weitaus jüngere Mascha. Eine leidenschaftliche Liebe entwickelt sich. Doch als das Landleben Mascha zu langweilen beginnt, stürzt sie sich in die dekadente Welt des russischen Adels.

The novel provides insight and a bit of satire regarding the everyday humdrum in small towns. Cranford is separated into 16 chapters, opening with a snapshot of Captain Brown and his two daughters who live in the book's namesake town: Cranford. The gossipy women of the town are slow to accept Brown socially, but they eventually welcome him into their circles. Captain Brown is later injured, and the responsibility of the house falls on his younger daughter.

En la cautivadora Ana de las Tejas Verdes, nos sumergimos en un mundo atemporal lleno de encanto, imaginación y lecciones universales. La historia sigue a Anne Shirley, una niña huérfana con una imaginación desbordante y un espíritu inquebrantable, mientras llega por error a la idílica granja Green Gables. Ambientada en la pintoresca Isla del Príncipe Eduardo a fines del siglo XIX, Ana, con su cabello pelirrojo y su corazón vibrante, conquista no solo el corazón de Marilla y Matthew Cuthbert, sino también el de todos en la comunidad.

A wounded Marine returns to Hawthorne Harbor years after the woman he was married to for exactly one week before she got an annulment...and then a baby nine months later. Can Hunter and Alice make a family out of past heartache? Hunter Magleby hasn't been back to Hawthorne Harbor in nine years. His parents have moved from the small beach town, but Hunter feels called to return to his roots after a career-ending injury overseas. He limps, literally, back into town, some unfinished business between him and the wife he left all those years ago. Alice Kopp got an annulment only a week into the ...