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In his small noodle shop in Te Whanganui-a-Tara, a young chef obsessively juliennes carrots. Nothing is going according to plan: the bills are piling up, his mother is dead, and there are strangers in his kitchen. The ancestors are watching closely.Told through a series of brilliant interludes and jump cuts, When I open the shop is sometimes blackly funny, sometimes angry and sometimes lyrical, and sometimes - as a car soars off the road on a horror road trip to the Wairarapa - it takes flight into surrealism. A glimpse into immigrant life in Aotearoa, this is a highly entertaining, surprising and poignant debut novel about grief, struggle and community.

In this short story collection, the acclaimed author of Our Crowd offers fourteen darkly funny and poignant tales of the human heart. Stephen Birmingham is renowned for his penetrating examinations of America's upper classes. Here, he proves himself an equally deft hand at fiction, bringing the same knowing wit and piercing insight to the short stories in this collection. In “She Ate Grass?,” a boy navigates coming of age while buying whiskey for his mother's cocktail party. In “Race Day,” a shy woman endures her husband's ambition to join the board of an exclusive yacht club. In these and other stories, Birmingham peels back the layers of middle-class life in the late twentieth century.

»Höher sei der Wille, das Herz kühner, der Mut umso mehr, wie unsre Macht schwindet.« England im 10. Jahrhundert. Bei der Stadt Maldon trifft ein Wikingerheer auf die Verteidiger von Essex. Hiervon erzählt ein altenglisches Gedicht, das kurz nach der Schlacht entstand. Es inspirierte J.R.R. Tolkien zu einem eigenen Versdrama: Die Heimkehr von Beorhtnoth Beorhthelms Sohn. Es ist Nacht. Zwei Männer stolpern über das Schlachtfeld. Der eine ein junger Bursche mit dem Kopf voller Träume. Der andere ein alter Bauer, der schon viele Kämpfe gesehen hat. Während sie im Dunkeln nach der Leiche ihres Herrn suchen, erkunden sie im Gespräch die Spannungen zwischen Jugend und Alter, von heidnischer und christlicher Weltsicht, die Ideale von Treue und Gemeinschaft und die Frage, was Heldentum bedeutet. Tolkiens dramatischer Dialog wird ergänzt durch seine Übersetzung der altenglischen Vorlage, Notizen und Essays aus dem Umfeld und eine frühe Fassung des Stücks in gereimten Versen. Dabei sind wissenschaftliche Arbeit und literarisches Schaffen untrennbar verbunden und führen am Ende weiter in die Welt von Der Herr der Ringe. Enthalten ist »Die Heimkehr von Beorhtnoth Beorhthelms Sohn« in der englischen Fassung und erstmals in deutscher Übersetzung. Ein Extrakapitel behandelt die »Tradition der Versbildung im Altenglischen«.

»Es gibt nicht genug Superlative, um die Schönheit dieses Romans zu beschreiben.« Sunday Independent Ulysses und Evelyn begegnen sich in einem italienischen Weinkeller und sprechen über Kunst und das Leben, zu einem Zeitpunkt, an dem die Schönheit in der Welt nicht leicht zu finden ist. Diese Begegnung knüpft zwischen ihnen ein lebenslanges Band der Freundschaft. Von den sonnenbeschienenen Hügeln der Toskana bis hin zum Londoner East End ist »Das Fenster zur Welt« ein lebensbejahender Roman über Schicksal, Liebe und Familie. Er ist ein junger britischer Soldat, sie ist eine sechzigjährige Kunsthistorikerin, die ihre geliebten Gemälde vor den Bomben des zweiten Weltkriegs bewahren will. Ein einziger Abend eröffnet Ulysses eine Sichtweise auf die Welt, die ihn für immer verändert. Nach dem Krieg kehrt er aus Florenz in seine Heimat London zurück, zu den alten Bekannten, die sich täglich in Col's Pub treffen. Dort wartet auch Peg, die Liebe seines Lebens, die ihr Herz aber an einen amerikanischen Soldaten verloren hat. Ulysses hofft auf einen Neuanfang. Da ihn seine Jahre in Italien nie loslassen, bricht er in ein ungewisses Abenteuer auf: ein Leben in Florenz. Im Gepäck hat er nicht nur Pegs Tochter Alys, sondern auch den alten Cress und den Papagei Claude. Sarah Winman hat einen warmherzigen, atmosphärischen Roman über Freundschaft und Schönheit geschrieben und darüber, dass es nie zu spät für einen Neubeginn ist, auch wenn man sich selbst dafür zu alt fühlt. »Die Seiten wimmeln von ungestümem, überschwänglichem Leben... Der Roman hat Schwung, Charme und ein großes Herz.« Sunday Times »Satz für Satz, Figur für Figur wird Das Fenster zur Welt zur Poesie« New York Times Book Review »Ein Stärkungsmittel für das Fernweh und ein Heilmittel für die Einsamkeit. Es ist dieser seltene, liebevolle Roman, bei dem man dankbar ist, dass er einen mitgenommen hat.« The Washington Post »Voller unvergesslicher Charaktere und voller Atmosphäre ist Das Fenster zur Welt eine fröhliche, sommerliche Ode an die Liebe, die Kunst und die Poesie.« Mail on Sunday »Eine wunderbare, großzügige Geschichte über freundliche Herzen und verwandte Geister... Einhoffnungsvoller, glücklicher, zutiefst menschlicher Roman'« Daily Mirror »Umwerfend, opulent und klug« The Times »Die schiere Freude an Sarah Winmans Erzählkunst ist ansteckend. Ich habe es geliebt, Zeit mit dieser unvergesslichen Gruppe von Charakteren in außergewöhnlichen Zeiten und an außergewöhnlichen Orten zu verbringen.« Graham Norton

A compelling and emotional novel that asks: What do you owe to a child you let go? A widow in her sixties, Geraldine is financially secure, happy, and about to marry her second husband, William. She's come a long way from being a motherless fourteen-year-old giving a baby up for adoption—but over the decades, she's made a special effort to support vulnerable girls as a way of compensating for her lingering guilt. Miles away in London, Beth has endured a painful divorce and the death of her adoptive mother—and now faces kidney disease. A transplant means waiting indefinitely for a stranger to die... unless someone volunteers as a living donor. She will not consider putting her three children at risk or burdening them with the truth, but with both her adoptive parents gone, could the time be right to track down the birth parents she knows nothing about? When biological mother and daughter finally meet, the emotions that accompany the reunion are complicated further by haunting questions: Is Beth driven by selfishness as much as—or more than—a desire to connect? Will Geraldine's urge to help Beth by being tested as a potential donor jeopardize her new life with William? What does she owe, and to whom? Thought-provoking and absorbing, this novel explores the meaning of family, the nature of guilt and regret, and the conflicts raised by the miracles of modern medicine.

On Shaky Ground is a modernist novel written in the late 1930s and early 1940s and was originally published in Nazi occupied Kharkiv in 1942. One of the best examples of intellectual fiction of the time, the work summarizes the struggles of the Ukrainian intelligentsia in the late 1920s and early 1930s, when totalitarian reality, together with rampant industrialization, started to affect everyday life. V. Domontovych is the pen name of Viktor Petrov, a historian and archaeologist, a representative of neoclassicism in Ukrainian literature. The novel follows the trajectory of art historian, Rostyslav Mykhailovych, who goes on a work trip from the capital city of Kharkiv to provincial Katerynoslav (today Dnipro), the place where he spent his childhood. In the late 1920s, a section of the Dnipro River became the place of a major industrial project, the construction of the largest hydroelectric station in Ukraine (Dniprelstan), which flooded the rapids over the river and led to serious ecological and social changes in the region. While the main goal of the trip is to save an old church from being turned into a museum, the journey becomes a philosophical reflection on dislocation and loss of connection with one's birthplace, traditions, religion and more globally, a sense of security.

Russ Clayton is a young man who keeps losing the important people in his life. Each time someone disappears, he finds himself left adrift. The Universe stacked against him. He only finds peace running alone on the roads of his small town in Kansas. Russ finally believes that everyone in his life is gone. Feeling abandoned, reckless, and liberated, he gives himself up wholly to the running by setting an impossible goal. But, he needs help. Long ago, Brad Coy was the fastest marathoner on the planet, but a man who also lost everything he valued to a cheating Russian runner named Yuri Grimlov. Finding a kinship, Coy and Russ team together, retreat to the desert, and undertake a quest to shatter the brain's protective hold on the body that prevents us from reaching our physical limits of speed and endurance. On the other side of the world, Grimlov has been charged with restoring Russia's tarnished reputation for doping its distance runners. He takes two young twin boys from their family and subjects them to his special mixture of psychological manipulation, doping, and scientific training. The boys, however, come to him already strongly shaped by their fraternal rivalries leavened with a heavy dose of their mother's demanding ethics and branded by their father's superstitions.

•• ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S SUMMER READING SELECTIONS •• What is motherhood in the midst of uncertainty, buried trauma and an unravelling America? What it's always been – a love song. Our narrator is a gifted photographer, an uncertain wife, an infertile mother, a biracial woman in an America that's coming undone. As she grapples with a lifetime of ambivalence about motherhood, yet another act of police brutality makes headlines, and this time the victim is Noah, a boy in her photography class. Unmoored by the grief of a recent, devastating miscarriage and Noah's fight for his life, she worries she can no longer chase the hope of having a child, no longer wants to bring a Black body into the world. Yet her husband Asher – contributing white Jewish genes alongside her Black-Japanese ones to any potential child - is just as desperate to keep trying. Throwing herself into a new documentary on motherhood and making secret visits to Noah in the hospital, this is when she learns she is, impossibly, pregnant. As life shifts once more, she must decide what she dares hope for the shape of her future to be. Fearless, timely, blazing with voice, Blue Hour is a fragmentary debut with unignorable storytelling power. The perfect next read for fans of Raven Leilani's Luster, Jenny Offill's Weather and Bernardine Evaristo's Girl, Woman, Other.'A portrait of determined creativity and the attempt to live authentically in a changing world. It's full of zest and keen observation, with a likeable, intimate tone that cuts through its potentially dark subject matter'- FINANCIAL TIMES'Gasp-worthy… How did Harrison achieve this spectacular feat of emotional withholding while also making readers feel so much?'– VULTURE'Incredibly powerful'– GOOD MORNING AMERICA'A brave new writer'– PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY'An urgent, heartbreaking, and profound meditation on motherhood, art-making, uncertainty, the ongoing violence of American racism and police brutality, and the courage it takes to choose the future'– BUZZFEED This novel contains depictions of police brutality and miscarriage.

In this darkly comic work of literary satire by New Zealand's most acclaimed and best-selling novelist Tama, a talking magpie and social media influencer, is the sole witness to a marriage in freefall. Tama is just a helpless chick when he is rescued by Marnie.'If it keeps me awake,'says Marnie's husband Rob, a farmer in the middle of a years-long drought,'I'll have to wring its neck.'But with Tama come new possibilities for the couple's future. Tama's fame is growing, and with it, his earning potential. The more Tama sees, the more the animal and the human worlds – and all the precarity, darkness and hope within them – bleed into one another. Like a stock truck filled with live cargo, the story moves inexorably towards its dramatic conclusion: the annual Axeman's Carnival. Part trickster, part surrogate child, part witness, Tama is the star of this story. And although what he says to humans is often nonsensical (and hilarious), the tale he tells makes disturbingly perfect sense. The Axeman's Carnival is Catherine Chidgey at her finest – comic, profound, poetic and true.

I made up my mind to meet you. Your book had cast a spell on me the previous night. What better way to stay spellbound than to orbit the magician? Razor-sharp and delectably witty, Like Happiness is a headfirst dive into a young woman's destructive obsession with a legendary writer for readers of Sheena Patel's I'm A Fan and Madeleine Grey's Green Dot.'Deeply felt and achingly intimate'ANNIE LORD'An epic unravelling of every love story, reclaimed as something sharp, seething, unsettling, and true'T KIRA MADDEN'Accomplishes a profound emotional electrocution that will leave you floating lighter for days'XOCHITL GONZALEZ __________ NetGalley reviewers love Like Happiness:'Beautifully written and unputdownable… I would read this over and over again''I simply love this book''My jaw was on the floor… I'd recommend it for fans of My Dark Vanessa'

'A brilliant, bleak moral maze of a novel'Guardian'Dazzling... by turns comic, lyrical and heartbreaking'Monica Ali'Profound and beautiful'Paul Murray, author of The Bee Sting'A vital, haunting, devastating read'Sarah Waters A publisher, who is at war with his industry and himself, embarks on a radical experiment in his own life and the lives of those connected to him; an academic exchanges one story for another after an accident brings a stranger into her life; and a family in rural India have their lives destroyed by a gift. These three ingeniously linked but distinct narratives, each of which has devastating unintended consequences, form a breathtaking exploration of freedom, responsibility, and ethics. What happens when market values replace other notions of value and meaning? How do the choices we make affect our work, our relationships, and our place in the world? Neel Mukherjee's new novel exposes the myths of individual choice, and confronts our fundamental assumptions about economics, race, appropriation, and the tangled ethics of contemporary life. Choice is a scathing, compassionate quarrel with the world, a masterful inquiry into how we should live our lives, and how we should tell them.'A magnificent achievement'Namwali Serpell'A superb writer... his greatest work yet'Michelle de Kretser

First comes surrogacy, then comes the messy gay breakup in Tom Pyun's tragi-comic debut novel that asks, is it ever too late to finally face yourself and grow up? Winston Kang and Jared Cahill seem like the perfect couple. When they check-in for their flight to Cambodia, where they're headed to meet the surrogate carrying their baby girl, even the woman at the airline counter recognizes it: “I'm so happy that marriage is legal for you guys,” she says. But while Jared is already planning for their second kid—half white like him, half Korean like Wynn—Wynn isn't ready to give up his dreams of becoming a hip-hop dancer to become'the hostage of a crying, pooping terrorist.'So he does what anyone in his position would do: He leaves Jared at the airport. Wynn sets off on a journey around the globe, trying to figure out what it means to put himself first, from auditioning for Misty Espinoza's comeback tour to organizing a Prince-themed flash mob. Oceans away, Jared starts to panic that no one in his life can talk to Meryl about her period or what it's like to grow up Asian American. Told in alternating points of view, Pyun's sardonic and addictive page-turner confronts questions of race, identity, and privilege, and facing the question of whether it's ever too late to finally face yourself and grow up.

Literature is a world of words and wonder, able to take us on almost unimaginable journeys from the wild and fantastic to the grind and minutiae of life.An author's ideas are his building blocks, his architecture of the mind, building a structure on which all else will rest; the narrative, the characters, the words - those few words that begin the adventure.In this series we look at some of our leading classic authors across two genres: the short story and the poem. In this modern world there is an insatiable need to categorise and pigeon-hole everyone and everything. But ideas, these grains and saplings of the brain, need to roam, to explore and find their perfect literary use vehicle. Our authors are masters of many literary forms, perhaps known for one but themselves favouring another.Story. Poems. Story. Within these boundaries come all manner of invention and cast of characters. And, of course, each author has their own way of revealing their own chapter and verse.

Literature is a world of words and wonder, able to take us on almost unimaginable journeys from the wild and fantastic to the grind and minutiae of life.An author's ideas are his building blocks, his architecture of the mind, building a structure on which all else will rest; the narrative, the characters, the words - those few words that begin the adventure.In this series we look at some of our leading classic authors across two genres: the short story and the poem. In this modern world there is an insatiable need to categorise and pigeon-hole everyone and everything. But ideas, these grains and saplings of the brain, need to roam, to explore and find their perfect literary use vehicle. Our authors are masters of many literary forms, perhaps known for one but themselves favouring another.Story. Poems. Story. Within these boundaries come all manner of invention and cast of characters. And, of course, each author has their own way of revealing their own chapter and verse.

'We knew very little with any certainty. One thing, though, was confirmed by everyone: that we were not the only ones flooded. For all we knew, every city across the globe had suffered a comparable fate.'As an unnamed city finds itself partially submerged below water, a small community of friends and lovers is forced to adapt to a world that has been radically transformed. An arresting vision of the wages of ecological disaster, Our Distance Became Water is at once lyrical, moving, and psychologically acute. Endlessly inventive in both style and substance, this is a singularly powerful literary response to environmental change.

Published in 1900, eleven years prior to her masterpiece Ethan Frome, Edith Wharton's novella The Touchstone explores the emotional complexities of love and betrayal. Penniless and unable to marry the woman he loves, the financially struggling lawyer Stephen Glennard discovers a way out of his predicaments by selling love letters written to him by deceased author Margaret Aubyn. Glennard's psychological anguish as he grapples with his guilt and the repercussions of his actions presents a poignant narrative of human conscience and morality.

Edith Nesbit was born on the 15th August 1858 in Kennington, then part of Surrey. Due to the health issues and tuberculosis of her sister Mary, Nesbit's early life was one of constant changes of house both in England and on the continent.At age 17, Nesbit met Hubert Bland and they married three years later―whilst she was 7 months pregnant. Bland also kept his affair with another woman going throughout their marriage and the two children of that relationship were raised by Nesbit as well as her own three with Bland.Together they were founder members of the Fabian Society in 1884 naming their son Fabian in its honour. They also edited the Society's journal; ‘Today'. Nesbit was an active lecturer and prolific writer on socialism during those years but gradually her work for them dwindled as her career as a children's writer grew. Her most famous success was ‘The Railway Children'but she was also very prolific and greatly accomplished in poetry, short stories―especially her macabre ghost and supernatural stories―and novels for adults. In February 1917, some three years after the death of Bland she married Thomas ‘the Skipper'Tucker in Woolwich, where he was a ship's engineer on the Woolwich Ferry.Edith Nesbit died from lung cancer on the 4th May 1924 at her house ‘The Long Boat'at Jesson, St Mary's Bay, New Romney in Kent. She was 65.

Edith Nesbit was born on the 15th August 1858 in Kennington, then part of Surrey. Due to the health issues and tuberculosis of her sister Mary, Nesbit's early life was one of constant changes of house both in England and on the continent.At age 17, Nesbit met Hubert Bland and they married three years later―whilst she was 7 months pregnant. Bland also kept his affair with another woman going throughout their marriage and the two children of that relationship were raised by Nesbit as well as her own three with Bland.Together they were founder members of the Fabian Society in 1884 naming their son Fabian in its honour. They also edited the Society's journal; ‘Today'. Nesbit was an active lecturer and prolific writer on socialism during those years but gradually her work for them dwindled as her career as a children's writer grew. Her most famous success was ‘The Railway Children'but she was also very prolific and greatly accomplished in poetry, short stories―especially her macabre ghost and supernatural stories―and novels for adults. In February 1917, some three years after the death of Bland she married Thomas ‘the Skipper'Tucker in Woolwich, where he was a ship's engineer on the Woolwich Ferry.Edith Nesbit died from lung cancer on the 4th May 1924 at her house ‘The Long Boat'at Jesson, St Mary's Bay, New Romney in Kent. She was 65.

Unfortunately, little biographical information is available for this author.Born is 1869 Asataro Mitamori was a Professor of English at Keio University, TokyoHe died in 1952.

The honour of founding the modern detective story belongs to an American writer. Such tales as'The Purloined Letter'and'The Murders in the Rue Morgue'still stand unrivalled.We in America no more than the world of letters at large, did not readily realize what Poe had done when he created Auguste Dupin—the prototype of Sherlock Holmes et genus omnes, up to the present hour. On Poe's work is built the whole school of French detective story writers. Conan Doyle derived his inspiration from them in turn, and our American writers of to-day are helped from both French and English sources. It is rare enough to find the detective in fiction even to-day, however, who is not lacking in one supreme quality,—scientific imagination. Auguste Dupin had it. Dickens, had he lived a short time longer, might have turned his genius in this direction. The last thing he wrote was the'Mystery of Edwin Drood,'the mystery of which is still unravelled. I have heard the opinion expressed by an eminent living writer that had Dickens'life been prolonged he would probably have become the greatest master of the detective story, except Poe.The detective story heretofore has been based upon one of two methods: analysis or deduction. The former was Poe's, to take the typical example; the latter is Conan Doyle's. Of late the discoveries of science have been brought into play in this field of fiction with notable results. The most prominent of such innovators, indeed the first one, is Arthur Reeve, an American writer, whose'Black Hand'will be found in this collection; which has endeavoured within its limited space to cover the field from the start—the detective story—wholly the outgrowth of the more highly developed police methods which have sprung into being within little more than half a century, being only so old.

Edith Nesbit was born on the 15th August 1858 in Kennington, then part of Surrey. Due to the health issues and tuberculosis of her sister Mary, Nesbit's early life was one of constant changes of house both in England and on the continent.At age 17, Nesbit met Hubert Bland and they married three years later―whilst she was 7 months pregnant. Bland also kept his affair with another woman going throughout their marriage and the two children of that relationship were raised by Nesbit as well as her own three with Bland.Together they were founder members of the Fabian Society in 1884 naming their son Fabian in its honour. They also edited the Society's journal; ‘Today'. Nesbit was an active lecturer and prolific writer on socialism during those years but gradually her work for them dwindled as her career as a children's writer grew. Her most famous success was ‘The Railway Children'but she was also very prolific and greatly accomplished in poetry, short stories―especially her macabre ghost and supernatural stories―and novels for adults. In February 1917, some three years after the death of Bland she married Thomas ‘the Skipper'Tucker in Woolwich, where he was a ship's engineer on the Woolwich Ferry.Edith Nesbit died from lung cancer on the 4th May 1924 at her house ‘The Long Boat'at Jesson, St Mary's Bay, New Romney in Kent. She was 65.

Edith Nesbit was born on the 15th August 1858 in Kennington, then part of Surrey. Due to the health issues and tuberculosis of her sister Mary, Nesbit's early life was one of constant changes of house both in England and on the continent.At age 17, Nesbit met Hubert Bland and they married three years later―whilst she was 7 months pregnant. Bland also kept his affair with another woman going throughout their marriage and the two children of that relationship were raised by Nesbit as well as her own three with Bland.Together they were founder members of the Fabian Society in 1884 naming their son Fabian in its honour. They also edited the Society's journal; ‘Today'. Nesbit was an active lecturer and prolific writer on socialism during those years but gradually her work for them dwindled as her career as a children's writer grew. Her most famous success was ‘The Railway Children'but she was also very prolific and greatly accomplished in poetry, short stories―especially her macabre ghost and supernatural stories―and novels for adults. In February 1917, some three years after the death of Bland she married Thomas ‘the Skipper'Tucker in Woolwich, where he was a ship's engineer on the Woolwich Ferry.Edith Nesbit died from lung cancer on the 4th May 1924 at her house ‘The Long Boat'at Jesson, St Mary's Bay, New Romney in Kent. She was 65.

“Art gotta be high up and dangerous,” the graffiti artist tells his mother. It has to be practiced diligently like playing the piano, the longtime members of a life drawing studio believe, and if your view of the model is the model's backside, you don't move for a better view. Art is a mysterious way into your model's sorrow when words fail. Art can open the rooms of your childhood. It existed before there was perspective. It can even be a dinner party. It can make a still life come alive, and it can heal a wounded spirit. Barbara de la Cuesta taught and worked as a journalist in South America. She now teaches Spanish. Her novel, The Spanish Teacher, was winner of the Gival Press Fiction Prize. About her most recent novel, Adam's Chair, Lauren Stafford, of the Manhattan Review of Books, wrote: “A tapestry of literary elegance… A contemporary novel for the ages.”

Flotes, això és el màxim que has aconseguit. Tens mitja feina, una habitació rellogada i un títol que acredita que ets dels que no poden caure. Però caus. El risc ha entrat a la teva vida sense que el veiessis venir. D'un dia per l'altre tot allò que no et podia passar esdevé real: perds el sostre, perds la feina i et parteixen la cara. Ara la vida ja no va de creure en les regles. Ara tu fabriques l'engany. Entraràs a les cases dels altres. Creuran que hi ets per netejar-les i fer-los la vida amable. El llop que no havies de trobar si feies bondat ets tu. ¿Oi que no tens res a perdre? Després del tríptic sobre la maternitat que l'ha fet mundialment coneguda, Eva Baltasar trastoca el nostre confort mental des d'un altre cantó, el del pacte social quan esdevé terrorista. La seva poesia canta la nit al ras, la inquietud de qui se sap invisible enmig de la ciutat. La seva lucidesa mostra el lloc on es toquen el crim i la devoció. I la seva nova novel·la va prenyada d'un conte on l'horror és la fada que pinta d'or el món.

Originally appearing in such venues as The Paris Review, Harper's and Tin House, these stories are at last readily available. In each, Stevens spies the big questions through the microscope of a shambolic human perspective. Ghost Pains is a triumphant statement of purpose from one of our greatest young writer-thinkers.

A powerful story of spiritual enlightenment and self-discovery, from the Nobel Prize-winning author of Siddhartha and Narcissus and Goldmund __________'Hesse is not a traditional teller of tales but a novelist of ideas and a moralist of a high order...The autobiographical undercurrent gives Demian an Existentialist intensity and a depth of understanding that are rare in contemporary fiction'Saturday Review'Beautifully written. It has a seriousness as compelling as that of The Waste Land'Observer'Rich and strange'New York Review of Books _________ Emil Sinclair is tormented by a constant battle between light and dark, purity and corruption, ignorance and knowledge. As a restless young man, he struggles to locate a path towards acceptance and serenity. Only under the friendship and guidance of the charismatic, otherworldly Max Demian does he discover an alternative way to think, and to live. Demian transforms a young man's coming-of-age story into a profoundly moving narrative of internal conflict and self-realization.

'Dazzling... Plot-packed, emotionally extravagant, dramatically intense'Guardian A sweeping story of forbidden love, of friendship and betrayal, power and revenge, set against the tumultuous political landscape of post-Independence IndiaVijaya and Sree are the daughters of the wealthy, landowning Deshmukh family, whose social status and power are absolute in the tiny village of Irumi. Krishna and Ranga are the sons of a widowed servant who works in the Deshmukh household. The four children should never have spoken, let alone forged a friendship. But the bonds they form are intense – and dangerous. When they are caught up in a devastating accident, the consequences ripple through their lives and send them scattering to different corners of India. Years later, when violent uprisings tear across the countryside, Vijaya and Krishna find themselves irresistibly drawn back to one another, despite the differences in their class and background. But this is not the India they once knew. Their country is changing, burning from the inside out. Irumi is no longer safe. •Longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize 2024•'A heart-wrenching tale of forbidden love.'Washington Post'Rao's illuminating tale of moral corruption and redemptive love is beautifully crafted [and] heralds a terrific new talent.'Observer'A spellbinding epic of land, class and family in post-independence India.'Aube Rey Lescure

Sixteen irreverent and inventive fictions that riff on rock and rap mythology to envisage alternate paths for music legends who died young.What if Biggie Smalls had survived the assassin's bullets and reinvented hip-hop with the help of an avant-garde luminary? If Amy Winehouse had shaken off her demons and channeled her inner Barbra Streisand into a new life on a tropical island? If Jeff Buckley had been pulled alive from the Mississippi by a devilish hand and become a pioneer of Southern black metal?With accompanying illustrations by Jeb Loy Nichols, Mark Swartz's stories imagine what might have happened to these stars and more—including Jimi Hendrix, Gram Parsons, Janis Joplin, Marvin Gaye, Lhasa de Sela, Lil Peep, and Jim Morrison—if their untimely deaths had been averted, or somehow had not been the end of their lives. Booklist praised Mark Swartz's fiction for its “lithe satirical humor, impressive intellectual dimension, and sly provocation,” and these qualities are on full display in these at once heartfelt and borderline absurd tales.

Els germans Taverner, Escil·la i Felix, passen uns dies a la casa familiar a la costa sud-oest d'Anglaterra en companyia d'uns amics; els sembla que estan vivint «el final d'una era, el començament d'una altra», i intenten assolir «una manera diferent de comprendre-ho tot». Tots, de fet, esperen que un fet transcendent, decisiu, els salvi d'aquella rutina diletant. I passa: al fons d'un pou, Picus i Clarence han trobat un objecte que —s'esforcen a creure— podria ser el sant Graal. Amb l'arribada de Carston, un convidat nord-americà, les relacions personals s'emboliquen més, amb moviments per amor o per enveja, i equívocs, i malentesos, i suposicions. Mentre al seu voltant batega una natura gairebé salvatge: el bosc remorejant, el penya-segat tallat a pic, el mar com un animal viu… És en la descripció i l'evolució dels personatges, en l'elusiva manera de mostrar-ne les accions i els sentiments, que Mary Butts, contemporània de Virginia Woolf o de Katherine Mansfield, és profundament original, amb una prosa sensorial i subtil, gens convencional. Traducció i presentació de Jordi Martín Lloret.

Barsetshire gathers to celebrate a milestone birthday at the Old Bank House in this conclusion to the much-loved, long-running series.A home is saved from destruction, a budding romance takes steps toward the altar, a doctor experiences the return of a former love—and the fine people of Barsetshire make plans for a festive extravaganza to mark Mrs. Morland's seventieth birthday... “Triumphantly completed” by Angela Thirkell's close friend C. A. Lejeune after Thirkell's death, Three Score and Ten features a host of new and old friends from the author's acclaimed series spanning decades of English country life (The New York Times). “Her writing celebrates the solid parochial English virtues of stiff-upper-lippery, good-sportingness, dislike of fuss, and low-key irony.... Light, witty, easygoing books.” —The New Yorker“Where Trollope would have been content to arouse a chuckle, [Thirkell] is constantly provoking us to hilarious laughter.... To read her is to get the feeling of knowing Barsetshire folk as well as if one had been born and bred in the county.” —Kirkus Reviews

A man who shares his name with a famous singer must grapple with his identity, purpose, and love. The Leonard Cohen at the center of Leonard Cohen: A Novel is an everyman, a would-be artist, a would-be lover, a would-be tragic figure, yet a man haunted by the greatness of his namesake. He struggles to compete. He struggles to be more than a punchline in his own mind. He struggles, in particular, to write one song as great as the least of the great Leonard Cohen's songs. At the center of Leonard's life is Daphne. In their meeting on a Greek island, a contemporary fable of Daphne and Apollo plays out. But even with Daphne, Leonard is shadowed by the other Leonard Cohen, whom he fears is the real Apollo. The ancient myth haunts the fated lovers, and the nobody Leonard Cohen's life becomes at once a mystery, a miracle, and a myth on its own terms. Once upon a time, Apollo fell hard for Daphne, who turned herself into a laurel tree. No less a fate awaits the protagonists of this slender yet universal novel, where art, love, and fame all fatefully intertwine.

Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, Naguib Mahfouz, offers this epic story of a single alley in Cairo and the generations that passed through it.A tumultuous neighbourhood known as'the alley'has seen successive heroes rise and fall as they struggle to defend the rights left to them by their great ancestor, Gebelawi.From the supreme feudal lord who disowns one son for pride and puts another to the test, to the saviour who tries to free his people from bondage, the men and woman of the alley seem unable to stop themselves from reenacting the lives of their holy forbearers. Through their successes and failures, the spiritual history of humankind is revealed.Hailed as'the single most important writer in modern Arabic literature'(Newsweek), Naguib Mahfouz displays the richness and variety of his storytelling in this Egyptian literary classic.'A powerful allegory of human suffering and striving.'New York Times'Immensely entertaining and deeply serious.'Chicago Tribune

How important is truth? What is normal? These are the questions raised in The Gift Child, Elaine McCluskey's fictional oeuvre — a funny, poignant, sure-shot novel, populated with a community of petty criminals, beloved broadcasters, undercover intelligence agents, and more. The novel opens with the disappearance of a man in Pollock Passage, Nova Scotia, a man last seen driving away from a government wharf with a giant tuna head in the basket of his Schwinn delivery bicycle. The man's name is Graham Swim; he's good at playing the harmonica and making friends. When Graham's cousin Harriett decides to investigate his disappearance, she comes up against her own family history. A news photographer now jobless and adrift, Harriett has lived most of her life in the shadow of her larger-than-life father — a once-beloved TV news anchor and borderline narcissist. When Harriett arrives in Pollock Passage, she meets a stranger who tells her he is researching the Shag Harbour UFO mystery. While this stranger helps Harriett reconnect with pieces of herself she thought long-dead, she also learns that what she knows about her father may not be true. Vintage McCluskey, The Gift Child showcases McCluskey's unique ability to capture the malleability of memory and the complex absurdity and nobility of humanity. It's a novel that's hard to put down; it's even harder to forget.

A debut literary page-turner from a new South African voice about fatherhood and family, loyalty and betrayal, inheritance and belonging. Daniel is a worldly and urbane journalist living in London. His relationships appear to be sexually fulfilling but sentimentally meager. A young gay man with no relationships outside of sexual ones, he can seem at once callow and, at times, cold to the point of cruel with his lovers. Emotionally distant from his elderly, senile father, Daniel nonetheless returns to South Africa to care for him during his final months. Following his father's death, Daniel learns of an unusual clause in the old man's will: he will only inherit his half of his father's considerable estate once he has spent time with Theon, a cousin whom he hasn't seen since they were boys, who lives on the old family farm in the Free State. Once there, Daniel discovers that the young son of the woman Theon lives with is seriously ill. With the conditions bearing on Daniel's inheritance shifting in real time, Theon and Daniel travel with the boy to Japan for an experimental cure and a voyage that will change their lives forever. S.J. Naudé's masterful novel is many things at once: a literary page-turner full of vivid, unexpected characters and surprising twists; a loving and at times shockingly raw portrayal of its protagonist's complex psyche; and a devastatingly subtle look into South Africa's fraught recent history.

From the author of Nives, a story of love, redemption, and resistance set in Italy during WWII Tuscany, November 1943. The village of Le Case is miles from any big city and appears rooted in an earlier century. Seen from there, even the war looks different—it is mostly a matter of waiting, praying, and mourning. As a fierce winter threatens, an order is issued by the local Fascist authorities: all Jews must be rounded up and detained in the bishop's villa to await deportation. Shy, solitary, and taciturn René is the town's cobbler. His only friend is the widow Anna, a woman with whom he has been secretly in love for years. When Anna's son joins the Resistance and is swiftly captured and shot by the Wehrmacht, the grieving woman vows to continue her son's mission, and one evening, she disappears into the woods. René later learns that a group of Resistance fighters has been ambushed and the survivors are imprisoned in the bishop's villa. A woman is among them, they say, a grieving mother and former inhabitant of Le Case. René can no longer stand by and watch as his town, his country, and his one great love become victims of the Nazis and their Fascist enablers, and he decides to take action. Perhaps for the first time in his life. Based on the true story of a nefarious collaboration between the Catholic diocese of Grosseto and the Fascist authorities, The Bishop's Villa is a masterful weaving together of fact and fiction by one of Italy's most exciting young writers.

'The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes'by Arthur Conan Doyle is a thrilling and iconic collection of detective stories featuring the brilliant detective Sherlock Holmes and his loyal friend Dr. John Watson. This collection brings together some of Holmes'most famous cases, including'A Scandal in Bohemia,''The Adventure of the Speckled Band,'and'The Red-Headed League.'Conan Doyle's writing captivates readers with its masterful storytelling, intricate plots, and the unparalleled deductive skills of Sherlock Holmes. Each story presents a unique mystery that challenges Holmes'intellect and astute powers of observation.Sherlock Holmes, with his razor-sharp wit and remarkable attention to detail, remains one of literature's most beloved and enduring characters. Dr. Watson's faithful narration provides readers with a window into the world of Victorian London and the enigmatic workings of Holmes'mind.'The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes'is a timeless classic that continues to enthrall readers of all ages. It has inspired countless adaptations, films, and television series, solidifying its place in literary history as the ultimate detective collection.Embark on a journey into the foggy streets of Victorian London, where mysteries abound and only Sherlock Holmes can unravel the truth. Arthur Conan Doyle's masterpiece is a must-read for anyone who enjoys the art of deduction and the thrill of solving intricate puzzles.ABOUT THE AUTHORArthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) was a Scottish author and physician best known for creating the iconic detective Sherlock Holmes. Born in Edinburgh, Scotland, Doyle's literary contributions spanned a wide range of genres, including mystery, science fiction, historical fiction, and more. Doyle's most famous character, Sherlock Holmes, made his debut in the novel'A Study in Scarlet'and went on to become one of the most beloved and enduring fictional detectives in literature. The character's brilliant deductive reasoning and keen observation skills set a standard for the detective genre that persists to this day. Beyond his detective stories, Doyle wrote historical novels, science fiction, and non-fiction works. He was a prolific author and a passionate advocate for various causes, including spiritualism and the reform of divorce laws. Doyle's legacy as a writer is marked by his ability to captivate readers with intriguing mysteries and memorable characters. His impact on the detective genre is immeasurable, and Sherlock Holmes remains a cultural icon, inspiring numerous adaptations and interpretations in literature, film, and television.

Brooklyn, mid-2000s. After leaving behind the comforts of a prestigious law firm, a restless attorney attempts to make ends meet by picking up odd jobs from a colourful assortment of clients. When the mysterious Anna Reddick turns up at his apartment with ten thousand dollars in cash and asks him to track down her missing husband, he trusts it will be an easy case. That is until the real Anna Reddick shows up - a magnetic but unpredictable literary prodigy - and he finds himself out of his depth and drawn into a series of deceptions involving Joseph Conrad novels, unscrupulous booksellers and seedy real estate developers. Set against the tail end of the analogue era, An Honest Living is a gripping story of artistic ambition, obsession, and the small crimes we commit against one another every day.

Imperial China meets Edwardian England in this epic story of loves lost and gained, set during the aftermath of the Opium Wars. Best friends Jiali and Wu Fang know that no man is a match for them. In their small harbour town of Fudi, they practise sword fighting, write couplets to one another, and strut around dressed as men. Jiali is a renowned poet and Wu Fang is going to be China's first female surgeon. But when Wu Fang returns from medical training in Japan, she is horrified to hear of Jiali's marriage to a man who cannot even match her couplets, and confused by her intense feelings of jealousy towards her friend's new husband, Yanbu. Ocean man Charles has arrived in Fudi to start a new life. He eschews the company of his fellow foreigners, preferring to spend time with new colleague Yanbu, his wife, Jiali, and her friend, Wu Fang. Over the course of several months, he grows close to them all, in increasingly confusing ways, but what will happen when he is forced to choose between his country and his friends? As tensions between the Manchu rulers and the people rise, and foreign battleships gather out to sea, loyalties will be tested in more ways than Jiali, Wu Fang, Yanbu, and Charles can possibly imagine.

“Giono's prose is a singularly fine blend of realism and poetic sensibility.” — The Washington PostGiono's very own Moby-Dick, a sensational maritime journey that follows a crew inwards on a spiritual tale of evocative sea-glimpsesAn allegorical critique of modern civilization and the damages of war, Giono's oft-overlooked seafaring tale sweeps the reader along a narrative as poetic and undulating as the wind, tacking between the sea's mysteries and the intricacies of the men's conversations and inner thoughts as they attempt to grasp the sensory reality around them.“I no longer have any interest in living under the conditions that this era allows,” writes the Captain of L'Indien, a ship whose radio remains packed in a crate in the hold. The men aboard won't be needing it; they have no interest in connecting with the world of ordinary men. With enough provisions to last them five years, they set sail in July of 1940 for the South Seas, leaving civilization behind in search of the unknown.Hastening onwards, Giono's men steer deeper into themselves, seeking a purpose beyond the “world in upheaval” they left behind—a moving and spiritual work written by one of Europe's most ardent 20th-century pacifists.A sensational novel that delves into the unknown reaches of the sea and soul, perfect for readers seeking a poetic escape that challenges the political and social status-quo.

National BestsellerNamed a must read by NPR, People, Vanity Fair, Electric Literature, Nylon, Alta Journal, CrimeReads and DebutifulNamed a most anticipated book by Elle, The Millions, Bustle, Lit Hub, Dandelion Chandelier, Zibby Mag, Bookpage, and The Rumpus“Oh my mushrooms, The Extinction of Irena Rey is incredibly strange, savvy, sly and hard to classify. I also couldn't put it down.” -The New York Times, Editors'ChoiceFrom the International Booker Prize-winning translator and Women's Prize finalist, an utterly beguiling novel about eight translators and their search for a world-renowned author who goes missing in a primeval Polish forest.Eight translators arrive at a house in a primeval Polish forest on the border of Belarus. It belongs to the world-renowned author Irena Rey, and they are there to translate her magnum opus, Gray Eminence. But within days of their arrival, Irena disappears without a trace.The translators, who hail from eight different countries but share the same reverence for their beloved author, begin to investigate where she may have gone while proceeding with work on her masterpiece. They explore this ancient wooded refuge with its intoxicating slime molds and lichens and study her exotic belongings and layered texts for clues. But doing so reveals secrets-and deceptions-of Irena Rey's that they are utterly unprepared for. Forced to face their differences as they grow increasingly paranoid in this fever dream of isolation and obsession, soon the translators are tangled up in a web of rivalries and desire, threatening not only their work but the fate of their beloved author herself. This hilarious, thought-provoking debut novel is a brilliant examination of art, celebrity, the natural world, and the power of language. It is an unforgettable, unputdownable adventure with a small but global cast of characters shaken by the shocks of love, destruction, and creation in one of Europe's last great wildernesses.

It is 1947 and the workers on the Dakar-Niger Railway have come out on strike. Sembène Ousmane, in this vivid and moving novel, evokes all of the colour, passion and tragedy of those decisive years in history.'Ever since they left Thiès, the women had not stopped singing. As soon as one group allowed the refrain to die, another picked it up, and new verses were born at the hazard of chance or inspiration, one word leading to another and each finding, in its turn, its rhythm and its place. No one was very sure any longer where the song began, or if it had an ending.'God's Bits of Wood is Sembène Ousmane's internationally renowned novel, based on his own experiences of the landmark 1947 railroad strike that spread across French West Africa.'A classic.'Guardian'Ousmane Sembène [was] a crucial figure in Africa's postcolonial cultural awakening.'New York Times'A powerful story.'KirkusTranslated from the French by Francis Price.

“Her writing celebrates the solid parochial English virtues of stiff-upper-lippery, good-sportingness,[and] dislike of fuss.... Light, witty, easygoing books.” —The New YorkerAs 1951 draws to a close, Christmas approaches—but the conservative upper class of Barsetshire have already received the gift they really wanted: Winston Churchill's re-election as prime minister. Nevertheless, their individual struggles carry on. A member of the House of Lords worries that marriage is not in the cards for him due to an insufficient fortune, while another man does manage to get engaged—but frets that his betrothed doesn't truly love him. The widow Lady Lufton misses her husband—as well as the money she's lost to taxes. And an aspiring scholar falls madly in love, but must choose between Oxford and the object of his affections... “[This] characteristically witty, nostalgic... novel in the beloved Barsetshire series describes the lingering effects of WWII on the fictional village that Thirkell adapted from its Victorian inventor and chronicler, Anthony Trollope.” —Publishers Weekly

“The people in The Third Realm are as vivid and convincing as Knausgaard's autobiographical persona... Enthralling... you can't stop reading.” —Lev Grossman, The Atlantic“One of the most genuinely suspenseful, alluring books I've ever read. Novel by novel, Knausgaard is replenishing some feral charge to the world.” —Brandon Taylor, The Washington PostFrom bestselling author Karl Ove Knausgaard, a kaleidoscopic novel about human nature in the face of enormous change—and the warring impulses between light and dark that live in all of usFor several days, a strange and bright new star in the sky above Norway has sown an unyielding sense of foreboding, of agitation, and of fear. Tove, a painter on holiday with her family, has spiraled into a psychosis that stirs her into a flurry of unbridled creativity. Geir, a policeman who has been investigating a grisly triple murder, comes to a sinister revelation he must keep to himself. Nineteen-year-old Line falls in love with the lead singer of a metal band and is lured into a secret and frightening world.But most bewildering, and disquieting, is the discovery made by Syvert, an undertaker: since the star has appeared, no one has died.In The Third Realm, Karl Ove Knausgaard returns to the spellbinding world of The Morning Star and The Wolves of Eternity, as a cast of new and familiar characters continue to reckon with the meaning of this star. What is haunting them, and why?As supernatural forces collide with the mundanities of everyday, and the threshold between life and death becomes diffuse, people are forced to live their lives as before while the world around them slowly changes in inexplicable ways. Piercing through human existence into the bestial and phantasmagorical, Knausgaard flings opens the gates to our most distressing neuroses and forces us to ask: What happens if the dark forces in the world are set free?

A beautiful, tender yet searing debut novel about intergenerational fractures and coming of age, following a young woman who immigrates to the United States from the Philippines and finds herself adrift between familial expectations and her own burning desires Love Can't Feed You is a stunning, heartbreaking, and compressed look at coming of age, shifting notions of home, and the disintegration of the American dream. It asks us: What does it mean to be of multiple cultures without a road map for how to belong? After a harrowing flight, Queenie, her younger brother, and their elderly Chinese father arrive in the United States from the Philippines. They're here to finally reunite with Queenie's Filipina mother, who has been working as a nurse in Brooklyn for the past few years—building a life that everyone hopes will set them up for better prospects. But her mother is not the same woman she was in the Philippines: Something in her face is different, almost hardened, and she seems so American already. Queenie, on the cusp of adulthood, has big dreams of attending college, of spending her days immersed in the pages of books. But there is not enough money for her and her brother to both be in school, so first she must work. Queenie rotates through jobs and settles, tentatively, into her new life, but her brother begins to withdraw and act out, and her father's anger swells. As the pressures of assimilation compound, and the fissures within her family deepen into fractures, Queenie is left suspended between two countries, two identities, and two parents.

A TV investigative reporter and his sister, a San Francisco PD homicide detective, look into the slayings of Bay Area cops who have shot unarmed African Americans yet faced no repercussions in this debut crime thriller.“Brian Copeland's thrilling debut novel is a revelation from an excitingly fresh voice ‘of color'in the arena of crime fiction... He manages to take a ‘ripped from the headlines'topic, the shooting of unarmed African Americans by police, and turn it into an exciting and entertaining blend of action, mystery, and social commentary.” —New York Times bestselling author JONATHAN KELLERMAN When San Francisco Police Officer Mickey Driscoll is gunned down in the driveway of his suburban Bay Area home in broad daylight, the suspects are numerous. Was the murder committed by someone close to him? An arrestee seeking revenge? Or was it one of the many rioters, activists, and militant groups harassing his family since he accidentally shot and killed an unarmed African American honor student? TV investigative reporter Topher Davis, the only Black journalist on that beat, has exactly three weeks to do one final story before his position is eliminated due to corporate budget cuts. Enlisting the aid of his sister, SFPD Homicide Detective Lynn Sloan, he decides to investigate what the families of Blacks killed by police--and the families of the cops themselves--go through when tragic events like this occur. Instead, they find themselves involved in an ever-expanding mystery as more officers who've committed the same offense turn up dead. Weaving their way through a world of grieving mothers and widows, African American militias, dirty cops, and drug dealers, they search for the truth that threatens to leave one... or both... siblings dead.

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author's brain, their soul and heart. A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere.In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens'across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author? The theme itself will form the boundaries for our stories which range from well-known classics, newly told, to stories that modern times have overlooked but perfectly exemplify the theme. Throughout the volume our authors whether of instant recognition or new to you are all leviathans of literature.Some you may disagree with but they will get you thinking; about our choices and about those you would have made. If this volume takes you on a path to discover more of these miniature masterpieces then we have all gained something.In this volume our classic authors from decades past look forwards into the future in their many ways. Their stories predict and expect many things. Intriguingly they interlace Sci-Fi with flavours and themes of other genres creating weird and wonderful stories that hold our attention with each turn of the page and fascinate our minds with their premise and execution.

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author's brain, their soul and heart. A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere.In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens'across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author? The theme itself will form the boundaries for our stories which range from well-known classics, newly told, to stories that modern times have overlooked but perfectly exemplify the theme. Throughout the volume our authors whether of instant recognition or new to you are all leviathans of literature.Some you may disagree with but they will get you thinking; about our choices and about those you would have made. If this volume takes you on a path to discover more of these miniature masterpieces then we have all gained something.In this volume our classic authors from decades past look forwards into the future in their many ways. Their stories predict and expect many things. Intriguingly they interlace Sci-Fi with flavours and themes of other genres creating weird and wonderful stories that hold our attention with each turn of the page and fascinate our minds with their premise and execution

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author's brain, their soul and heart. A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere.In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens'across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author? The theme itself will form the boundaries for our stories which range from well-known classics, newly told, to stories that modern times have overlooked but perfectly exemplify the theme. Throughout the volume our authors whether of instant recognition or new to you are all leviathans of literature.Some you may disagree with but they will get you thinking; about our choices and about those you would have made. If this volume takes you on a path to discover more of these miniature masterpieces then we have all gained something.The German peoples spent centuries as tribes and regions without being a whole. Otto von Bismarck was instrumental in unifying these central European states into one country albeit based on the militaristic doctrine of Prussia. In the 20th Century its history was blighted by its capacity to resort to war to fulfill its ambitions, or right its perceived historical wrongs. In more modern times the nation is now seen as central to a peaceful and stable continent.In this volume the short stories by its greatest authors readily attest that their talents are equal to the greatest in World literature.

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author's brain, their soul and heart. A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere.In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens'across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author? The theme itself will form the boundaries for our stories which range from well-known classics, newly told, to stories that modern times have overlooked but perfectly exemplify the theme. Throughout the volume our authors whether of instant recognition or new to you are all leviathans of literature.Some you may disagree with but they will get you thinking; about our choices and about those you would have made. If this volume takes you on a path to discover more of these miniature masterpieces then we have all gained something.In this volume we examine the German language. Or rather the authors who wrote in German but are here translated into English. German is most often called the language of philosophers due to its precision and clarity. However, if you've studied German, you will know that sentence construction can be difficult to grasp. However, within these stories the language of these great talents express themselves in dazzling prose and searching narratives. And the characters? Clearly the works of genius.

Dr. Faustus is a great Elizabethan tragedy by Christopher Marlow originally published in 1600. The story is based on an earlier anonymous classic German legend involving worldly ambition, black magic and surrender to the devil. It remains one of the most famous plays of the English Renaissance.Dr. John Faustus, a brilliant, well-respected German doctor grows dissatisfied with the limits of human knowledge - logic, medicine, law, and religion, and decides that he has learned all that can be learned by conventional means. What is left for him, he thinks, but magic. His friends instruct him in the black arts, and he begins his new career as a magician by summoning up Mephastophilis, a devil. Despite Mephastophilis's warnings about the horrors of hell, Faustus tells the devil to return to his master, Lucifer, with an offer of Faustus's soul in exchange for twenty-four years of service from Mephastophilis.On the final night before the expiration of the twenty-four years, Faustus is overcome by fear and remorse. He begs for mercy, but it is too late. At midnight, a host of devils appears and carries his soul off to hell.Marlowe's dramatic interpretation of the Faust legend is a theatrical masterpiece. With immense poetic skill, and psychological insight that greatly influenced the works of William Shakespeare and other dramatists, Dr. Faustus combines soaring poetry, psychological depth, and grand stage spectacle. Marlowe created powerful scenes that invest the work with tragic dignity, among them the doomed man's calling upon Christ to save him and his ultimate rejection of salvation for the embrace of Helen of Troy.