Classic Science

Most of us remember The Wizard of Oz as the film starring Judy Garland and Bert Lahr. But the film was based on an immensely popular early 20th century Oz series. In these novels, Oz is the utopian land beyond the rainbow where threats are turned back with valor and ingenuity. Their success is due to the way they induce children to look for the element of wonder in the world around them.

When Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm published their Children's and Household Tales in 1812, followed by a second volume in 1815, they had no idea that such stories as "Rapunzel", "Hansel and Gretel", and "Cinderella" would become the most celebrated in the world. Yet few people today are familiar with the majority of tales from the two early volumes, since in the next four decades the Grimms would publish six other editions, each extensively revised in content and style.

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 fae world isn't fueled by magic. It's fueled by fear. The Hopeless realm isn't at all what Zakara expected it to be. And neither is she. The powers of the Eminence are hard to harness, and she needs them now more than ever. Survival of the human world suddenly depends on her. But more dangers lurk in the realm than they realize.

Phoebe is the fated priestess, a channel for magic, whether she likes it or not. A piece of golden jewelry might hold the key to a plot to suppress the priestess's true magic. Until she can find the secrets, however, she has to stay alive and keep her four guardians in line: Sir Forrest, her grumpy and reluctant but truly devoted protector; Gilbert the bard, who fell in love with the Prince of Gaermon before he discovered his true fate; Niko the Lucky Dragon, an arrogant smuggler who bows to no one but won't make a move without rolling his dice; and one who is her sworn enemy.

She was just an ordinary mortal...until death catapulted her into a seductive world she never imagined. "You're dead" is so not what Allie Watson wants to hear. Unfortunately, it explains a lot. Like the dark, angelically handsome man who ferried her to this strange, hidden land. The last thing she remembers is stepping off a curb in front of a cross-town bus. Now she's surrounded by gorgeous fallen angels with an unfortunate taste for blood---and they really don't want her around. Not exactly how she pictured heaven.

Nineteen Eighty-Four (also published as 1984) is a dystopian social science fiction novel and cautionary tale by English writer George Orwell. It was published on 8 June 1949 by Secker & Warburg as Orwell's ninth and final book completed in his lifetime. Thematically, it centres on the consequences of totalitarianism, mass surveillance and repressive regimentation of people and behaviours within society. Orwell, a democratic socialist, modelled the authoritarian state in the novel on Stalinist Russia and Nazi Germany.

Trantor had extended its rule over half the Galaxy, but the other half defied its authority, defending their corrupt fiefdoms with violence and repression. On the planet Florina, the natives labored as slaves for their arrogant masters on nearby Sark. But now both worlds were hurtling toward a cataclysmic doom, and only one man knew the truth - a slave unaware of the secret knowledge locked inside his own brain. Rik had once been a prominent scientist until a psychic probe erased all memories of his past. Now he was a humble laborer in the kyrt mills of Florina.

John Carter, Prince of Helium, has been imprisoned for a Martian year, his wife in another cell - alive or dead, he doesn't know. In this continuation of the saga of the amazing world of Barsoom, the love story of Carter and Dejah Thoris - the red-skinned, oviparous princess - unfolds. Like all the tales in the series, fantasy and adventure combine in a style as malleable as dreams, exotic and dangerous and unending.

Eighteen-year-old Aidan Salt isn't a superhero. With his powerful (and unpredictable) telekinetic abilities, he could be one if he wanted to, but he doesn't. He's unambitious, selfish, and cowardly, and he doesn't want to have to deal with all the paperwork required to become a professional superhero. But since the money, fame, and women that come with wearing the cape are appealing, he decides to become the first supervillain the world has seen in more than 20 years: Apex Strike.

Kull, king of Valusia, was overcome with unrest and was unsure of what he needed to do. A girl of the castle told him to seek Tuzun Thune, a wizard who knew all the secrets of life and death. When Kull visits the wizard, he learns that the wizard uses mirrors to allow Kull to look into the past and the future. But it is the mirror that shows only his own reflection that sends Kull into a distracting world of contemplation.

Sword-Singer once again unites Del and Tiger - she among the greatest of Northern sword masters, he a Southern warrior of legendary skills - on a new and perilous journey into the North, to the Place of Swords, where Del must submit to trial-by-combat for the slaying of her sword-master.

Grace, as her friends call her, has a Ford Motor Company tattoo running down her leg and grease worked deep into her hands. She works at Sanchez Motorworks customizing hot rods. Finding the line in a classic car is her calling. Now Grace has to find the line in her own life. Grace loves John, and John loves her, and that would be wonderful, except that John, like Grace, has unfinished business: He's haunted by the childhood death of his younger brother. He's never stopped feeling responsible.

Pierce Ambrose. That was the name of the man I'd been sent to kill. The man I'd failed to kill. I have one day left to make good on my contract before the thugs holding my sister and her son start sending me pieces of them. Pierce Ambrose. A man with a secret I didn't uncover until it was too late to turn back, too late to give up on trying to kill him. Now, if I want to see my sister and nephew again, I have to try one last time. My name is Mac Brennan, and this time I'm playing for keeps.

The Small House at Allington introduces Trollope's charming heroine, Lily Dale, to the Barsetshire scene. Lily is the niece of Squire Dale, an embittered old bachelor living in the main house on his property at Allington. He has loaned an adjacent small house rent free to his widowed sister-in-law and her daughters, Lily and Bell. But the relations between the two houses are strained, affecting the romantic entanglements of the girls.

Stalky & Co. is a book published in 1899 (following serialization in the Windsor Magazine) by Rudyard Kipling, about adolescent boys at a British boarding school. It is a collection of linked short stories in format, with some information about the charismatic Stalky character in later life. The character Beetle, one of the main trio, is partly based on Kipling himself. Stalky is based on Lionel Dunsterville, M'Turk is based on George Charles Beresford, and Mr. King is based on William Carr Crofts.

Karigan G’ladheon, running away from school, is traveling through a deep forest when a galloping horse pounds up to her, its rider impaled by two black-shafted arrows. With his dying breath, he tells her he is a Green Rider, one of the magical messengers of the King. Before he dies, he makes Karigan swear to deliver the message he’s carrying, and gives her his green coat, with the symbolic brooch of his office.

A forbidden romance. A deadly plague. Earth's fate hinges on one girl.... Cinder, a gifted mechanic in New Beijing, is also a cyborg. She's reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister's sudden illness. But when her life becomes entwined with the handsome Prince Kai's, she finds herself at the centre of a violent struggle between the desires of an evil queen and temptation.

Half-witch Kiki never runs from a challenge. So when her 13th birthday arrives, she's eager to follow a witch's tradition: choose a new town to call home for one year. Brimming with confidence, Kiki flies to the seaside village of Koriko and expects that her powers will easily bring happiness to the townspeople.

Emerson Clarke thought magic might solve all her problems. Turns out, magic only made her life more complicated. Her sick mother is in a worse position than before, and Em just made a risky deal with an Unseelie prince: he will heal her mother if Em agrees to the ultimate alliance - marriage. With the possibility of finally getting the one thing she's always wanted, Em enters the dangerous world of the Unseelie Court. She'll learn whatever she has to about magic and etiquette in order to fake her way through palace life until Prince Roarke fulfills his side of the bargain.