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Heart of Darkness is a novella written in 1899 by Anglo-Polish novelist Joseph Conrad. It is about a voyage into the Congo Free State in the heart of Africa, by the story's narrator Marlow, an introspective sailor who takes a job as a riverboat captain with the Company, a Belgian concern organized to trade in the Congo. Marlow, aboard a boat anchored on the River Thames in London, recounts to his friends the story of his assignment to journey up...

Both a picaresque and Bildungsroman, The History of Tom Jones follows the life of its hero from his discovery as a foundling on the property of Squire Allworthy in England's West Country to his banishment from the estate and subsequent journey to London to escape an arranged marriage. Tom's many dalliances and misadventures throughout add to the charm of this bawdy romantic comedy.

In "Mrs. Dalloway", Virginia Woolf invites readers to step into the bustling streets of post-World War I London, where Clarissa Dalloway prepares for a high-society party. This seemingly simple premise becomes a window into the intricacies of the human mind, as Woolf weaves together the lives of Clarissa, Septimus (a shell-shocked soldier), and others with seamless narrative shifts. The novel's revolutionary use of stream-of-consciousness storytelling...

Step into the enchanting world of "The Enchanted April" by Elizabeth von Arnim, a captivating novel that whisks readers away to the sunny shores of Italy. Set in the 1920s, the story follows the transformative journey of four diverse women who embark on a shared holiday to escape their mundane lives. Lottie Wilkins and Rose Arbuthnot, two dissatisfied Englishwomen, discover an advertisement for a month-long rental of an Italian castle. Eager for...

"Michael Strogoff: The Courier of the Czar" is a novel written by Jules Verne in 1876. Critics, including Leonard S. Davidow, writing from Reading, Pennsylvania, in his 1937 introduction to The Spencer Press reprint as a volume in its "Classic Romances of Literature" series consider it one of Verne's best books. Unlike some of Verne's other famous novels, it is not science fiction, but a scientific phenomenon is a plot device. The book was later adapted...

This 1872 sequel to Lewis Carroll's beloved Alice's Adventures in Wonderland finds the inquisitive heroine in a fantastic land where everything is reversed. Looking-glass land, a topsy-turvy world lurking just behind the mirror over Alice's mantel, is a fantastic realm of live chessmen, madcap kings and queens, strange mythological creatures, a garden of talking flowers, and rude insects. Brooks and hedges divide the lush greenery of looking-glass...

A remote castle in Wales inhabited by three older men is the last place on earth that a young, lively girl of 18 would want to spend time. And yet, when forced by circumstances to take up residence there for six weeks prior to coming of age, Jessie surprises them all by finding immense enjoyment in the experience and by capturing each of her adopted uncles' hearts. As the time grows near for her to return to England, the three brothers find it necessary...

Embark on an exhilarating celestial adventure with Jules Verne's "Around the Moon." As the sequel to the groundbreaking "From the Earth to the Moon," this novel continues the daring exploits of the brave astronauts from the Baltimore Gun Club. Cast into space by a colossal cannon, their spacecraft, the Columbiad, is destined for a journey around the moon, plunging the crew into the heart of the unknown. "Around the Moon" is a testament to Verne's...

Dangerous Liaisons is a masterpiece of intrigue and seduction, unfolding within the glittering salons of 18th-century France. Written entirely in the form of letters, this epistolary novel invites readers into a web of manipulation, where words are weapons and charm conceals cruelty. Through the correspondence of the Marquise de Merteuil and the Vicomte de Valmont, Laclos exposes the delicate art of emotional conquest and the moral decay beneath refinement. What...

Set amid the rapidly changing social, spiritual, and moral landscape of the industrial revolution, North and South is a forceful, brilliant, and romantic novel about freedom and the cost of profit. When Margaret Hale, a minister's daughter, relocates with her family to Milton in the north of England she witnesses firsthand the brutal working conditions in Milton's factories and mills. Her liberal education has given her strong convictions, but little...