English Classic Short Stories

Anton Chekhov is widely considered one of the best short-story writers of all time. Having influenced such writers as Ernest Hemingway, Raymond Carver, and James Joyce, Chekhov’s stories are often noted for their stream-of-consciousness style and their vast number. Raymond Carver once said, “It is not only the immense number of stories he wrote - for few, if any, writers have ever done more - it is the awesome frequency with which he produced masterpieces, stories that shrive us as well as delight and move us, that lay bare our emotions in ways only true art can accomplish.”

Philip K. Dick was an award-winning giant of American science fiction, right up there with Ray Bradbury and Isaac Asimov. He became the first science fiction writer ever to be included in The Library of America series. Although he died fairly young at 53, he created many incredible sci-fi stories - 44 published novels and over 120 short stories! These 14 selections represent some of his most imaginative work. Included in this collection are: "Adjustment Team", "The Golden Man", "A World of Talent", "The Last of the Masters", "The Crystal Crypt", and more.

Welcome to the Monkey House is a collection of Kurt Vonnegut's shorter works. Originally printed in publications as diverse as The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and The Atlantic Monthly, what these superb stories share is Vonnegut's audacious sense of humor and extraordinary range of creative vision.

The Victorian-era writers featured in this collection are known for their power of invention and command of horror and the supernatural. Included are "A Watcher by the Dead" by Ambrose Bierce; "The Body Snatchers" by Robert Louis Stevenson; "The Adventure of the German Student" by Washington Irving; "Dickon the Devil" by J. Sheridan Le Fanu; "The Fall of the House of Usher" by Edgar Allan Poe; and "The Open Watcher" by Saki.

The revered author’s definitive collection of short fiction, which explores enduring spiritual and science fiction themes such as space, time, reality, fantasy, God, and the fate of humankind. As powerful, inventive, and profound as his theological and philosophical works, The Dark Tower reveals another side of Lewis’s creative mind and his longtime fascination with reality and spirituality. It is ideal listening for fans of J. R. R. Tolkien, Lewis’s longtime friend and colleague.

Young, impressionable Aubrey is fascinated by the enigmatic Lord Ruthven, and accompanies him on a tour to Europe. But Aubrey develops a growing distaste for Lord Ruthven’s sinister and grotesque conduct - especially as it concerns human blood. This novella, penned during that tempestuous night in Switzerland amongst such notables as Percy Shelley, Lord Byron, and Mary Shelley, served as the great inspiration for Bram Stoker to create Dracula.

A young peasant finds himself confronting a doctor at a hospital with the hopes of convincing him to release his brother. The doctor is not pleased and refuses to release him saying the peasant needs to go to the authorities. He is disappointed by his statement and unsure of where to go. On his way out he comes to meet an old man just outside the hospital gate. He reveals his problem to him and the old man directs him exactly where he needs to head. The peasant is conflicted because it is a long journey....

Over 10 hours of riveting stories by some of the world’s greatest short-story writers.

From a childish fear of the dark in "The End of the Party" to the chilling conclusion of the "Destructors" and the all-consuming selfishness of "May We Borrow Your Husband", this collection opens with three of Greene's most disturbing stories. Things take a surreal turn in "Under the Garden" before finally blossoming for a moment in "Two Gentle People", then there's a detective story and a brush with Greene's sardonic wit to finish.

Evergreen Classic Short Stories for Children brings together some of the most popular and beloved stories by celebrated authors like Guy de Maupassant, James Joyce and Rudyard Kipling, and extracts from classics such as Pride and Prejudice and The Great Gatsby. With a mix of genres including mystery, romance, crime and supernatural, and a host of popular characters such as Tom Sawyer, Sherlock Holmes, Mr Darcy and Jo March, this is the perfect book to immerse yourself in a range of classic literature.

The second novel of the Codex of Souls furthers explores the strange occult world first introduced in Lightbreaker. Mark Teppo’s vision of a magical underworld is a non-stop adventure that continues to bring new light to the occult origins of our history. Markham returns to Paris where he lost his love, and nearly his life. The ancient order of manipulative magicians that once cast him out is now in turmoil...a turmoil made all the greater by the swaths of destruction that Markham tried to avert.

A chilling short story from the author of Dracula. In the Valley of the Shadow is a tale about a delirious man and his hallucinations while hospitalized.

Discover a world of heroes and villains, suspense and intrigue. This riveting and comprehensive collection brings together some of the best crime writing of all time. Ruth Rendell and Frances Hegarty spearhead the modern genre, moving through the popular and rarely recorded Graham Greene, to Edgar Wallace and G.K. Chesterton and his master detective Father Brown. And that's not all.

It's the literary equivalent of buried treasure! The audiobook edition features a cast of celebrity narrators who will bring these stories to life. In an introduction to the collection, Cohen explains the significance these seven stories have, not only as lost treasures, but as transitional stories in Dr. Seuss's career. This is a collection of stories that no Seuss fan (whether scholar or second-grader) will want to miss!

Emma Bovary is the original desperate housewife. Beautiful but bored, she is married to the provincial doctor Charles Bovary yet harbors dreams of an elegant and passionate life. Escaping into sentimental novels, she finds her fantasies dashed by the tedium of her days. Motherhood proves to be a burden; religion is only a brief distraction. In an effort to make her life everything she believes it should be, she spends lavishly on clothes and on her home and embarks on two disappointing affairs.

Here is the precursor to Jurassic Park. Victorian explorers have heard there is a remote plateau where dinosaurs still survive, and a group set outs on a dangerous mission to find out more about it.

Guy de Maupassant, French master of the short story, had a simple, efficient style of writing and, like Anton Chekhov, found inspiration for his stories in the daily lives of humans, which often reveal our darker nature. Many of his works also centered on the Franco-Prussian War, in which he served.

Markham has returned to Seattle, searching for Katarina, the girl who, a decade ago, touched his soul, literally tearing it from his body. But what he discovers upon arriving is dark magick - of a most ancient and destructive kind! An encounter with a desperate spirit, leaping destructively from host to host, sets Markham on the trail of secretive cabal of magicians seeking to punch a hole through heaven, extinguishing forever the divine spark.

Sometimes a journey can be of discovery. And in this compilation, Ruskin Bond has discovered hair-raising stories of other people's journeys taken many, many years ago. Bond describes the old track from Rajpur to Mussorie, surrounded by oak trees and colonial buildings in 'The Kipling Road'. Braving blizzards and bandits, M. Huc takes a momentous journey to Ladakh in 'Journey to the Forbidden City', while Osa Johnson, the only woman adventurer in the book, gives her awe-inspiring account of cannibals in 'A Woman Among Cannibals'.

The profoundly original and wildly entertaining short stories of a legendary Twilight Zone writer. It is only natural that Charles Beaumont would make a name for himself crafting scripts for The Twilight Zone - for his was an imagination so limitless it must have emerged from some other dimension. Perchance to Dream contains a selection of Beaumont's finest stories, including five that he later adapted for Twilight Zone episodes.