Family Life Classics

When the Tooting family finds an old engine and fits it to their camper van, they have no idea what kind of adventure lies ahead. The engine used to belong to an extraordinary car, and it wants its bodywork back! But as the Tootings hurtle across the world rebuilding the original Chitty, a sinister baddie is on their trail - one who will stop at nothing to get the magnificent car for himself.

When Bev and Felix arrive at the King farm in Prince Edward Island, they have no idea of the adventures and memories in store for them. Is old Peg Bowen really a witch? What secrets does the neighbor keep hidden in his spare room? What if tomorrow is the end of the world? And what is in the old blue chest? Along with their cousins, they learn the value of work and play, the wisdom of proverbs, how to struggle with temptations and face their fears.

Summer, 1947. Kate Herrick, a war widow, returns to her childhood home for a final visit before the house is sold. But Rose Cottage is not the idyllic paradise she remembers from her youth and someone has been there before her. As Kate uncovers an old secret that haunts the home she thought she knew, she is forced to confront a dark truth from her own past.... Beyond the weedy garden with its riot of rose bushes, nothing had changed. And someone was crossing the bridge to approach the garden gate. Someone I knew well....

When Father is taken away unexpectedly, Roberta, Peter, Phyllis and their mother have to leave their comfortable life in London to go and live in a small cottage in the country. The children seek solace in the nearby railway station and make friends with Perks the Porter and the Station Master himself. Each day, Roberta, Peter and Phyllis run down the field to the railway track and wave at the passing London train, sending their love to Father.

Millions of readers around the world have followed the story of the gentle wood-carver and carpenter who was first introduced in 1983 in Joseph Girzone’s beloved parable, Joshua. In Joshua's Family, Girzone travels back in time, painting a captivating portrait of the mother and father who nurtured Joshua, and of the friends and neighbors who viewed the unusually precocious child with an uneasy balance of wonder and skepticism.

In the fifth book in the series, Anne's own true love, Gilbert Blythe, is finally a doctor, and, in the sunshine of the old orchard among their dearest friends, they are about to speak their vows. Soon, the happy couple will be bound for a new life together in their own dream house on the misty purple shores of Four Winds Harbor. But a new life means fresh problems to solve - and fresh surprises. As Anne and Gilbert begin to build that new life, some of those problems and surprises come in the form of their new neighbors.

Orphaned cousins Jane and Lucilla, both 19, receive the exciting news that their guardian is at last allowing them to leave boarding school. But their rosy future is thwarted when they find he has made some bad investments and fled, leaving them with a cottage in the English countryside and a modest bank account.

Louisa May Alcott's classic novel, set during the Civil War, has always captivated even the most reluctant listeners. Little girls, especially, love following the adventures of the four March sisters - Meg, Beth, Amy, and most of all, the tomboy, Jo - as they experience the joys and disappointments, tragedies and triumphs, of growing up. This simpler version captures all the charm and warmth of the original.

Eight-year-old Elsie Dinsmore is enjoying a blissful Christmas holiday season with her family and friends when a crisis arises that threatens life as she knows it. She believes that obeying a request her father has made would violate her conscience, and she must refuse him. He, in turn, believes Elsie is being willful and disobedient, and he fails to see her refusal as a matter of her deep, abiding faith in God.

As Elsie Dinsmore grows up and becomes a young woman, her family undergoes major changes. Her father, Horace Dinsmore, falls in love and marries sweet Rose Allison, whom Elsie has loved since childhood. Soon two new members, Horace Jr. and Rosebud, join the happy family.

As if simply being 14 years old wasn't bad enough - what with the usual teenage angst and uncertainty, Vicky Austin's always comforting and reliable home life is changing completely. Her brother John is going off to college in the fall. Maggy, an orphan taken in by the Austins two years ago, has gone to live with her legal guardian. And the rest of Vicky's family is moving from their quiet house in the country to the heart of New York City. But before the big move, the entire Austin family is taking a meandering trip across the country.

After a tumultuous year in New York City, the Austins are spending the summer on the small island where their grandfather lives. He's very sick, and watching his condition deteriorate as the summer passes is almost more than Vicky can bear. To complicate matters, she finds herself as the center of attention for three very different boys.

The most acclaimed Scottish novel of all time, Sunset Song is a powerful portrait of a land and people in turmoil, seen through the life and struggles of its heroine, Chris Guthrie. In the years up to and beyond the First World War, Chris' resilience, like the land itself, endures despite everything and is portrayed with a lyrical intensity that echoes through the years and still resonates today.

The entire family is thrown into turmoil, however, when a carriage accident threatens the life and sanity of Grandpa Dinsmore and Aunt Enna, and Violet is burned with a troublesome secret. Everyone in the family is thrilled as young Elsie blossoms under the warmth of new love, but sorrow strikes as Lily is gathered into the arms of the Good Shepherd despite all the efforts to save her life.

The Austins are trying to settle into their new life in New York City, but their once close-knit family is pulling away from each other. With the Austins going in different directions, they don't notice that something sinister is going on in their neighborhood - and it's centered around them. A mysterious genie appears before Rob and Emily. A stranger approaches Vicky in the park and calls her by name. Members of a local gang are following their father. The entire Austin family is in danger. If they don't start telling each other what's going on, someone just might get killed.

Durraghglass is a beautiful mansion in Southern Ireland, now crumbling in neglect. The time is the present - a present that churns with the bizarre passions of its owners' past. The Swifts - three sisters of marked eccentricity, defiantly christened April, May and Baby June, and their only brother, one-eyed Jasper - have little in common, save vivid memories of darling Mummy, and a long lost youth peculiarly prone to acts of treachery.

Six children decide that the only way to restore the fortunes of their family is to go out and do it themselves. They produce a series of madcap schemes and one after another try them out with varying degrees of success, most resulting in trouble rather than riches. But then one scheme begins to look more promising than the rest.

Un riche misanthrope brouillé avec le monde entier à l'exception de ses fidèles employés, Mr et Mrs Boffin, meurt après avoir fait fortune en exploitant les décharges de Londres (dustheaps). Son testament stipule que sa fortune est transmise à son fils, John Harmon, qu'il ne voit plus, mais à condition qu'il revienne du lointain étranger où il s'est établi - sans doute l'Afrique du SudN 5 -, pour la recevoir. Cette disposition est assortie d'une autre clause : Harmon doit épouser une jeune femme qu'il ne connaît pas, Miss Bella Wilfer.

Twilight Sleep, a gothic satire of Jazz Age New York, was an instant best-seller when it was released in 1927. Quintessential Edith Wharton, it is stylish and sharp, at turns scathing, hilarious and melodramatic, but also deeply and surprisingly human. In a modernist twist, the story is told by three distinct narrators—19-year-old Nona Manford, her unflappable socialite mother Pauline, and Nona’s father and Pauline’s second husband, divorce lawyer Dexter Manford. All are trying to save the marriage of Nona’s half-brother, Jim Wyant, and his wife Lita.

Five tales which range from the jungles of India to the frozen emptiness of the North... In all of them, Kipling's extraordinary powers of description and ability to identify with human aspiration and animal survival are vividly shown. Rikki-Tikki-Tavi must battle with Nag, the cobra, in his territory; Toomai has a unique glimpse of the elephant world, Kotick, the White Seal, searches for sanctuary, while Kotuko has to find food for his starving Eskimo village. Above all, Kipling's love of life in all its variety shines through.