Family Life Classics

In this classic story, first published in 1906, a false accusation places the father in jail, leaving his wife and three children on their own. Circumstances force mother and the children to leave their ideal life in London to live near a train station in a rustic cottage. As the good natured children work to rescue their father, they befriend and help others along the way.

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.

The Cut Glass Bowl is the story of the beautiful but ill-fated Evelyn Piper, who succumbs to the power of a cut glass bowl - a wedding gift from a spurned former beau. It is a unique and powerful portrait depicting how frivolous choices can lead to deterioration and loss of all that one loves. It was written by F. Scott Fitzgerald in 1920 as a short story for Colliers magazine.

'Young Adult Classics' is a new series from Naxos AudioBooks which aims to bring key works of literature to a young audience in abridged form. Lively, accessible readings with music is the key. Jane Eyre is the tale of a young governess who becomes entangled with the powerful Mr Rochester, finding mystery and uneasiness in his house.

Read by award-winning narrator Mike Vendetti, this short story written in 1850 by Charles Dickens is beautiful in its simplicity. A boy grows to a man with the memory of him and his now dead sister gazing upon the evening star, imagining it as a gate to heaven.

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.

Maggie and Tom, brother and sister, try to save their livelihood as their parents flounder in the face of modernization. Maggie befriends the disabled son of a family rival in an attempt to build bridges, and Tom fights hard to reclaim the family property. Having drifted apart, they are brought back together in the novel's dramatic and moving conclusion.

Willa Cather is considered to be one of the best chroniclers of pioneer life in the 20th century. She had a long and distinguished career writing essays, poems, short stories, and novels. This story is a powerful example of a frequent theme: the haunting, sometimes painful, contrast between city and country life.

Here is one of London's famous stories of the Klondike, where men had to battle the elements, and often each other, to survive.

A wonderful holiday excerpt from the classic Little Women features all of your favorite characters as they prepare to celebrate Christmas in their enthusiastic, optimistic, take-no-prisoners fashion.

An upper-middle class peasant inherits his father's farm, which he hopes to pass on to his children. When the twin boys are born, there is joy in the family until they realize that they are severely retarded - to use the term of the day, idiots. And then another son is born, also an idiot. In desperation, Jean Pierre joins the church, which he has no use for, and a daughter is born. Another idiot. Jean Pierre becomes even more angry and abusive to his wife, whom he blames for producing four idiots.

A Christmas Carol is undoubtedly the most famous supernatural story in English. However, it was not the only supernatural story of the season that Charles Dickens wrote. In Victorian England, Christmas was the time to explore the supernatural in stories, and Charles Dickens was one of the best at it. Included in this volume are a full-cast dramatization of A Christmas Carol, plus three more of Dickens' best stories of the season.

One of the most popular pieces in the author's Main Travelled Roads collection was "The Return of a Private", a story that certainly rings true today. A soldier returns home only to find that his experiences have changed things forever.

On a dark and stormy night, three strangers seek shelter at a young girl's christening party. Thomas Hardy was an English poet, novelist, and short story writer. He is famous for his depictions of Wessex, an imaginary county. Many of his stories also reflected his sense of the tragedy in human life.

Mary Lennox is sent to Misselthwaite Manor in Yorkshire England after her parents die from Cholera. Also living in the manor house is her sickly cousin Colin, who is every bit as spoiled as she. Mary and Colin are like two peas in a pod, closed up in a gloomy old manor on the Yorkshire moors, until a secret garden captures their imaginations. As spring brings new life to the Earth, Mary and Colin's sour natures begin to change.

This title shows children the beauty of nature and how it relates to God. This short, little book will help your child pay attention to the most important things in life. Family and being in nature can be a child's entire world growing up. Where Is God, Grandfather? is a wonderful story about teaching children how to relate to God in nature and daily family life. The superb storytelling of Candy O'Donnell makes this book a jewel for all children.

In Bullerbü zu leben ist das Allerschönste auf der Welt, findet Lisa. Im ganzen Dorf gibt es nur drei Höfe, und Lisa, Lasse, Bosse, Inga, Britta und Ole spielen von früh bis spät. Die besten Tage sind natürlich, wenn Weihnachten ist und man Geburtstag hat. Aber auch sonst ist immer was los. Auf dem Heuboden schlafen, sich verkleiden, Großvater vorlesen und Hütten bauen macht in Bullerbü riesigen Spaß.

One of the earliest creative approaches to feminist literature, this sinister horror story tells of a woman's mental anguish and unconscious struggle with conformity in a society that generally viewed women as weak and hysterical creatures unable to think for themselves. The author, Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935), a prominent American feminist, paved the way for other authors like Sylvia Plath and Alice Walker. She suffered mental illness during her life and ultimately committed suicide.

'Twas the night before Christmas. Ebenezer Scrooge was alone, when suddenly he heard a ghostly moan. A ghost it was, took him back to the past, then to the present and future days in hope that Scrooge would mend his ways.

Zauberhaft und geheimnisvoll ist Astrid Lindgrens Märchenwelt. Petra und Peter, zwei Kinder so groß wie Puppen, tauchen plötzlich in der Schule auf...