Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest is a madcap farce about mistaken identities, secret engagements, and lovers' entanglements that continues to delight readers more than a century after its 1895 publication and premiere performance. The rapid-fire wit and eccentric characters have made it a mainstay of the high school curriculum for decades.

Cecily Cardew and Gwendolen Fairfax are both in love with the same mythical suitor. Jack Worthing has wooed Gwendolen as Ernest, while Algernon has also posed as Ernest to win the heart of Jack's ward, Cecily. When all four arrive at Jack's country home on the same weekend, the "rivals" fight for Ernest's undivided attention and the "Ernests" to claim their beloveds—pandemonium breaks loose. Only a senile nursemaid and an old, discarded handbag can save the day.

This edition includes a glossary and reader's notes to help the modern reader appreciate Wilde's wry wit and elaborate plot twists.

The Sandman: Endless Nights is a mesmerizing collection of graphic stories that blend modern myth and dark fantasy. This series of award-winning graphic novels interweaves historical drama, contemporary fiction, and legend.

Joined by a dream team of artists from around the world, Neil Gaiman, the Hugo Award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of American Gods and Coraline, returns to the beloved characters he made famous in The Sandman: Endless Nights. Alternately haunting, bittersweet, erotic, and nightmarish, the seven stories in this book—one for each of the Endless siblings, each illustrated by a different artist—reveal strange secrets and surprising truths.

In addition to the seven tales of the Endless, The Sandman: Endless Nights includes a biography section in the spirit of the Sandman collections (designed by Dave McKean) and a summary of each volume in the Sandman Library.

The year is A.D. 793. Jack and his sister have been kidnapped by Vikings and taken to the court of Ivar the Boneless and his terrifying half-troll wife. But things get even worse when Jack finds himself on a dangerous quest to find the magical Mimir's Well in a far-off land, with his sister's life forfeit if he fails.

Other threats include a willful mother Dragon, a giant spider, and a troll-boar with a surprising personality — to say nothing of Ivar the Boneless and his wife, Queen Frith, a shape-shifting half-troll, and several eight-foot tall, orange-haired, full-time trolls. But in stories by award-winner Nancy Farmer, appearances do deceive.

She has never told a richer, funnier tale, nor offered more timeless encouragement to young seekers than: Just say no to pillaging.

Kingdoms wobble, crowns topple and knives flash on the magical Discworld as the statutory three witches meddle in royal politics. The wyrd sisters battle against frightful odds to put the rightful king on the throne. At least, that's what they think...

Minerva Dobbs knows that happily-ever-after is a fairy tale, especially with a man who asked her to dinner to win a bet. Even if he is gorgeous and successful Calvin Morrisey. Cal knows commitment is impossible, especially with a woman as cranky as Min Dobbs. Even if she does wear great shoes, and keep him on his toes. When they say good-bye at the end of their evening, they cut their losses and agree never to see each other again.

But Fate has other plans, and it's not long before Min and Cal meet again. Soon, they're dealing with a jealous ex-boyfriend, Krispy Kreme donuts, a determined psychologist, chaos theory, a freakishly intelligent cat, Chicken Marsala, and more risky propositions than either of them ever dreamed of. Including the biggest gamble of all—true love.

Cerulean Sins, the eleventh entry in the hugely-popular Anita Blake series, finds everyone’s favorite vampire hunter keeping house and kicking butt.

Anita Blake is trying to get her life back to “normal” after a break-up with her werewolf lover. She has settled into a pattern of domesticity, which means that the new man in her life, the leopard shapeshifter Micah, has no problem sharing her with Jean-Claude, Master Vampire of the City.

Things are as peaceful as they ever get for someone who raises the dead, when Jean-Claude receives an unexpected and unwelcome visitor: Musette, the very beautiful, very twisted representative of the European Council of Vampires.

Anita soon finds herself caught up in a dangerous game of vampire power politics. To add to her troubles, she is asked to consult on a series of brutal killings, which seem to be the work of something un-human. The investigation leads her to Cerulean Sins, a vampire-run establishment that deals in erotic videos, videos that cater to very specific tastes.

Anita knows one creature of the night who has such interests — Jean-Claude’s visitor. But if Anita brings Musette down, the repercussions could cost her everything she holds dear.

Once a sworn enemy of all monsters, Anita is now the human consort of both Master Vampire Jean Claude and leopard shapeshifter Micah. When a centuries-old vampire hits St. Louis, Anita finds herself needing all the dark forces her passion can muster to save the ones she loves.

Anita Blake returns to find hell hath no fury like a vampire scorned.

Golan Trevize, former Councilman of the First Foundation, has chosen the future, and it is Gaia. A superorganism, Gaia is a holistic planet with a common consciousness so intensely united that every dewdrop, every pebble, every being, can speak for all—and feel for all. It is a realm in which privacy is not only undesirable, it is incomprehensible. But is it the right choice for the destiny of mankind?

While Trevize feels it is, that is not enough. He must know. Trevize believes the answer lies at the site of humanity's roots: fabled Earth... if it still exists. For no one is sure where the planet of Gaia's first settlers is to be found in the immense wilderness of the Galaxy. Nor can anyone explain why no record of Earth has been preserved, no mention of it made anywhere in Gaia's vast world-memory. It is an enigma Trevize is determined to resolve, and a quest he is determined to undertake, at any cost.

At the center of Mountains Beyond Mountains stands Paul Farmer. Doctor, Harvard professor, renowned infectious-disease specialist, anthropologist, the recipient of a MacArthur "genius" grant, world-class Robin Hood, Farmer was brought up in a bus and on a boat, and in medical school found his life’s calling: to diagnose and cure infectious diseases and to bring the lifesaving tools of modern medicine to those who need them most.

Mountains Beyond Mountains takes us from Harvard to Haiti, Peru, Cuba, and Russia as Farmer changes minds and practices through his dedication to the philosophy that "the only real nation is humanity"—a philosophy that is embodied in the small public charity he founded, Partners in Health. He enlists the help of the Gates Foundation, George Soros, the U.N.’s World Health Organization, and others in his quest to cure the world.

At the heart of this book is the example of a life based on hope, and on an understanding of the truth of the Haitian proverb "Beyond mountains there are mountains": as you solve one problem, another problem presents itself, and so you go on and try to solve that one too.

Life has been good for Becky Bloomwood: She's become the best personal shopper at Barneys, and she and her successful entrepreneurial boyfriend, Luke, are living happily in Manhattan’s West Village. Her new next-door neighbor is a fashion designer!

But with her best friend, Suze, engaged, how can Becky fail to notice that her own ring finger is bare? Not that she's been thinking of marriage (or diamonds) or anything... Then Luke proposes! Bridal registries dance in Becky’s head. Problem is, two other people are planning her wedding:

Becky’s overjoyed mother has been waiting forever to host a backyard wedding, with the bride resplendent in Mum’s frilly old gown. Meanwhile, Luke’s high-society mother is insisting on a glamorous, all-expenses-paid affair at the Plaza. Both weddings for the same day. And Becky can’t seem to turn down either one.

Can everyone’s favorite shopaholic tie the knot before everything unravels?

Lestat. The vampire hero of Anne Rice's enthralling new novel is a creature of the darkest and richest imagination. Once an aristocrat in the heady days of pre-revolutionary France, now a rock star in the demonic, shimmering 1980s, he rushes through the centuries in search of others like him, seeking answers to the mystery of his eternal, terrifying existence.

His is a mesmerizing story — passionate, complex, and thrilling.

The optimism of the early sixties, infused with the excitement of the space race and the menace of the Cold War, is filtered through the rich imagination of high-spirited, eight-year-old Madeleine, who welcomes her family's posting to a quiet Air Force base near the Canadian border.

Secure in the love of her beautiful mother, she is unaware that her father, Jack, is caught up in a web of secrets. When a very local murder intersects with global forces, Jack must decide where his loyalties lie, and Madeleine will be forced to learn a lesson about the ambiguity of human morality—one she will only begin to understand when she carries her quest for the truth, and the killer, into adulthood twenty years later.

In an evocative and fast-paced adventure on the high seas and on a faraway island, an orphan boy named Peter and his mysterious new friend, Molly, overcome bands of pirates and thieves in their quest to keep a fantastical secret safe and save the world from evil. Best-selling authors Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson have turned back the clock to reveal the wonderful story that precedes J. M. Barrie’s beloved Peter Pan. Peter and the Starcatchers is brimming with richly developed characters, from the scary but somehow familiar Black Stache and ferocious Mister Grin to the sweet but sophisticated Molly and fearless Peter. Page after page of riveting adventures take readers of all ages on a voyage from a filthy, crime-ridden port in old England across the turbulent sea. Aboard the Neverland is a trunk that holds the “greatest treasure on earth” —but is it gold, jewels, or something far more mysterious and dangerous? Roiling waves and raging storms; skullduggery and pirate treachery provide the backdrop for battles at sea. Bone-crushing breakers eventually land our characters on Mollusk Island—where the action really heats up. This impossible-to-put-down tale leads readers on an unforgettable journey—fraught with danger yet filled with mystical and magical moments.

Je suis né dans la ville d'Aubagne, sous le Garlaban couronné de chèvres, au temps des derniers chevriers. Ainsi commence l'autobiographie de Marcel Pagnol, immortel auteur de La Trilogie marseillaise, La Femme du boulanger, entre autres savoureuses histoires à l'accent chantant.

On découvre ici l'enfance du jeune Marcel et sa découverte des collines enchantées des environs de Marseille. La famille Pagnol loue pour les vacances une bastide près d'un petit village. Le père de Marcel s'initie à la chasse et sera l'auteur d'un coup de fusil magistral qui lui vaudra l'admiration de tous, à commencer par celle de son fils, et qui donne son titre au livre.

Ce premier tome est suivi de deux autres, Le Château de ma mère et Le Temps des secrets. L'incroyable mémoire et le talent de conteur de l'auteur restituent merveilleusement les joies simples, les chagrins énormes, la délicieuse naïveté de l'enfance, sans omettre les tours pendables et bêtises en tous genres qui la ponctuent nécessairement.

Une histoire vraie belle comme un roman, bourrée de tendresse et d'émotion, pleine de drôlerie aussi. On lit, on relit, on s'y reconnaît. À travers la sienne, Marcel Pagnol raconte toutes les enfances... du moins telles qu'elles devraient être.

In his first novel since Corelli’s Mandolin, Louis de Bernières creates a world and populates it with characters as real as our best friends, launching it into the maelstrom of twentieth-century history.

The setting is a small village in southwestern Anatolia in the waning years of the Ottoman Empire. Everyone there speaks Turkish, though they write it in Greek letters. It’s a place that has room for a professional blasphemer; where a brokenhearted aga finds solace in the arms of a Circassian courtesan who isn’t Circassian at all; where a beautiful Christian girl named Philothei is engaged to a Muslim boy named Ibrahim. But all of this will change when Turkey enters the modern world.

Epic in sweep, intoxicating in its sensual detail, Birds Without Wings is an enchantment.

Every war has turning points and every person too.

Fifteen-year-old Daisy is sent from Manhattan to England to visit her aunt and cousins she's never met: three boys near her age, and their little sister. Her aunt goes away on business soon after Daisy arrives.

The next day bombs go off as London is attacked and occupied by an unnamed enemy. As power fails, and systems fail, the farm becomes more isolated. Despite the war, it's a kind of Eden, with no adults in charge and no rules, a place where Daisy's uncanny bond with her cousins grows into something rare and extraordinary.

But the war is everywhere, and Daisy and her cousins must lead each other into a world that is unknown in the scariest, most elemental way.

A riveting and astonishing story.

From the prize-winning author of Motherless Brooklyn, comes a daring, riotous, sweeping novel that spins the tale of two friends and their adventures in late 20th-century America.

This is the story of two boys, Dylan Ebdus and Mingus Rude. They live in Brooklyn and are friends and neighbors; but since Dylan is white and Mingus is black, their friendship is not simple.

This is the story of 1970s America, a time when the simplest decisions — what music you listen to, whether to speak to the kid in the seat next to you, whether to give up your lunch money — are laden with potential political, social, and racial disaster. This is also the story of 1990s America, when nobody cared anymore.

This is the story of what would happen if two teenaged boys obsessed with comic book heroes actually had superpowers: they would screw up their lives.

The Matarese Circle is an international circle of killers that threatens to take over the world within just two years. Only two rival spies have the power to stop them: Scofield, CIA, and Talaniekov, KGB. They share a genius for espionage and a life of explosive terror and violence.

Though these sworn enemies once vowed to terminate each other, they must now become allies. Only they possess the brutal skills and ice-cold nerves vital to their mission: destroy the Matarese.

Scott Pilgrim's life is totally sweet. He's 23 years old, he's in a rock band, he's "between jobs," and he's dating a cute high school girl. Nothing could possibly go wrong, unless a seriously mind-blowing, dangerously fashionable, rollerblading delivery girl named Ramona Flowers starts cruising through his dreams and sailing by him at parties. Will Scott's awesome life get turned upside-down? Will he have to face Ramona's seven evil ex-boyfriends in battle? The short answer is yes. The long answer is SCOTT PILGRIM, VOLUME 1: SCOTT PILGRIM'S PRECIOUS LITTLE LIFE.

Boston medical examiner Dr. Maura Isles literally meets her match and must face a savage serial killer and shattering personal revelations in this brilliant novel of suspense.

Dr. Maura Isles makes her living dealing with death. As a pathologist in a major metropolitan city, she has seen more than her share of corpses every day—many of them victims of violent murder. But never before has her blood run cold, and never has the grim expression “dead ringer” rung so terrifyingly true. Because never before has the lifeless body on the medical examiner’s table been her own.

Yet there can be no denying the mind-reeling evidence before her shocked eyes and those of her colleagues, including Detective Jane Rizzoli: the woman found shot to death outside Maura’s home is the mirror image of Maura, down to the most intimate physical nuances. Even more chilling is the discovery that they share the same birth date and blood type. For the stunned Maura, an only child, there can be just one explanation. And when a DNA test confirms that Maura’s mysterious doppelgänger is in fact her twin sister, an already bizarre murder investigation becomes a disturbing and dangerous excursion into a past full of dark secrets.

Searching for answers, Maura is drawn to a seaside town in Maine where other horrifying surprises await. But perhaps more frightening, an unknown murderer is at large on a cross-country killing spree. To stop the massacre and uncover the twisted truth about her own roots, Maura must probe her first living subject: the mother that she never knew... an icy and cunning woman who could be responsible for giving Maura life—and who just may have a plan to take it away.

Cloud Atlas, authored by David Mitchell, is a visionary novel that combines elements of adventure, mystery, and philosophical speculation. The narrative begins in 1850 with Adam Ewing, an American notary traveling from the Chatham Isles to California. During his journey, he becomes acquainted with Dr. Goose, who treats him for a rare brain parasite.

The story then leaps to Belgium in 1931, where we meet Robert Frobisher, a disinherited composer who finds himself in the household of an ailing maestro. The narrative continues to shift, taking us to the West Coast in the 1970s with Luisa Rey, a reporter uncovering a conspiracy, and then to various other settings including a near-future Korean superstate and a post-apocalyptic Hawaii.

The unique structure of Cloud Atlas sees the narrative fold back on itself, with characters' fates intertwining across time and space. It's a novel that questions the nature of reality and identity, and how our actions reverberate through history. Mitchell's work is as playful as it is profound, earning it the status of a modern classic and a worldwide phenomenon.

Lirael has never felt like a true daughter of the Clayr. Now, two years past the time when she should have received the Sight that is the Clayr's birthright, she feels alone, abandoned, unsure of who she is. Nevertheless, the fate of the Old Kingdom lies in her hands. With only her faithful companion, the Disreputable Dog, Lirael must undertake a desperate mission under the growing shadow of an ancient evil.

In this sequel to Sabriel, Garth Nix weaves a spellbinding tale of discovery, destiny, and danger.

The Great Escape is one of the most famous true stories from the last war. It narrates the extraordinary tale of how more than six hundred men in a German prisoner-of-war camp worked together to orchestrate a remarkable breakout.

Every night for a year, they dug tunnels beneath the camp. Those who weren't digging were busy forging passports, drawing maps, faking weapons, and tailoring German uniforms and civilian clothes to wear once they had escaped. All of this was done under the very noses of their prison guards.

When the right night came, the actual escape was timed to the split second. But, of course, not everything went according to plan...

Detective Thursday Next has had her fill of her responsibilities as the Bellman in Jurisfiction. Packing up her son, Friday, Thursday returns to Swindon accompanied by none other than the dithering Danish prince Hamlet.

But returning to SpecOps is no snap—as outlaw fictioneer Yorrick Kaine plots for absolute power, the return of Swindon's patron saint foretells doom, and if that isn't bad enough, back in the Book World The Merry Wives of Windsor is becoming entangled with Hamlet.

Can Thursday find a Shakespeare clone to stop this hostile takeover? Can she vanquish Kaine and prevent the world from plunging into war? And, most important, will she ever find reliable childcare?

Find out in this totally original, action-packed romp, sure to be another escapist thrill for Jasper Fforde's legion of fans.

The Member of the Wedding, Carson McCullers's classic, showcases the inimitable twelve-year-old Frankie, who is utterly, hopelessly bored with life until she hears about her older brother's wedding. Bolstered by lively conversations with her house servant, Berenice, and her six-year-old male cousin—not to mention her own unbridled imagination—Frankie takes on an overly active role in the wedding, hoping even to go, uninvited, on the honeymoon, so deep is her desire to be the member of something larger, more accepting than herself.

This story is a marvelous study of the agony of adolescence, showcasing Carson McCullers at her most sensitive, astute, and lasting best.

Enter The Realm of Possibility and meet a boy whose girlfriend is in love with Holden Caulfield; a girl who loves the boy who wears all black; a boy with the perfect body; and a girl who writes love songs for a girl she can't have.

These are just a few of the captivating characters readers will get to know in this intensely heartfelt new novel about those ever-changing moments of love and heartbreak that go hand-in-hand with high school. David Levithan plumbs the depths of teenage emotion to create an amazing array of voices that readers won't forget. So, enter their lives and prepare to welcome the realm of possibility open to us all. Love, joy, and these stories will linger.

Illywhacker is a dazzling comic narrative, from the lips of the 139-year-old Herbert Badgery, the 'illywhacker' or confidence trickster of the title. Overflowing with magic, jokes, and inventions, it is a story peopled with aviators, car salesmen, Chinamen, and impresarios. Peter Carey's novel is a contemporary classic.

Herbert Badgery is a vagabond and charlatan, aviator and car salesman, seducer and patriarch. He might very well be the embodiment of Australia's national character, especially in its fondness for tall stories and questionable history. As this charming scoundrel traverses the continent and a century's worth of outlandish encounters, one truth emerges: Herbert Badgery may in fact be the king of all con men.

For Harry Dresden, Chicago's only professional wizard, there have been worse assignments than going undercover on the set of an adult film. Dodging flaming monkey poo, for instance. Or going toe-to-leaf with a walking plant monster. Still, there is something more troubling than usual about his newest case. The film's producer believes he's the target of a sinister entropy curse, but it's the women around him who are dying, in increasingly spectacular ways.

Harry is doubly frustrated because he got involved with this bizarre mystery only as a favor to Thomas, his flirtatious, self-absorbed vampire acquaintance of dubious integrity. Thomas has a personal stake in the case Harry can't quite figure out, until his investigation leads him straight to Thomas' oversexed vampire family. Harry is about to discover that Thomas' family tree has been hiding a shocking secret; a revelation that will change Harry's life forever.

Lina's trendy bakery in Tulsa is proving to be less than lucrative, and she must come up with a plan. When she stumbles upon an Italian Goddess cookbook, Lina can't help but think she's found the answer to her problem—even if it means invoking a goddess to save her business.

Soon enough, Lina finds herself face-to-face with Demeter, who has a plan of her own. She proposes that Lina exchange souls with Persephone, the Goddess of Spring, who will breathe new life into the bakery. In return, Lina must set order to the Underworld.

Before all this, Lina's problems mostly involved sourdough and second dates. Now that she embodies the enchanting Persephone, Lina has weightier things on her mind—like the formidable task of bringing Spring to a world of spirits. But when the handsome, brooding Hades kindles a spark in her heart, Lina wonders if this Lord of the Underworld might be the man of her dreams.

Anita Blake is small, dark, and dangerous. Her turf is the city of St. Louis. Her job: re-animating the dead and killing the undead who take things too far. But when the city’s most powerful vampire asks her to solve a series of vicious slayings, Anita must confront her greatest fear—her undeniable attraction to master vampire Jean-Claude, one of the creatures she is sworn to destroy...

Prized through the ages for its splendor and its savage, sophisticated wit, The Metamorphoses is a masterpiece of Western culture--the first attempt to link all the Greek myths, before and after Homer, in a cohesive whole, to the Roman myths of Ovid's day. Horace Gregory, in this modern translation, turns his poetic gifts toward a deft reconstruction of Ovid's ancient themes, using contemporary idiom to bring today's reader all the ageless drama and psychological truths vividly intact.

Storm of Steel is a memoir of astonishing power, savagery, and ashen lyricism. It illuminates not only the horrors but also the fascination of total war, seen through the eyes of an ordinary German soldier.

Young, tough, patriotic, but also disturbingly self-aware, Jünger exulted in the Great War, which he saw not just as a great national conflict, but more importantly as a unique personal struggle. Leading raiding parties, defending trenches against murderous British incursions, simply enduring as shells tore his comrades apart, Jünger kept testing himself, braced for the death that would mark his failure.

Published shortly after the war's end, Storm of Steel was a worldwide bestseller and can now be rediscovered through Michael Hofmann's brilliant new translation.

Historian and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Barbara Tuchman has brought to life again the people and events that led up to World War I. With attention to fascinating detail, and an intense knowledge of her subject and its characters, Ms. Tuchman reveals, for the first time, just how the war started, why, and how it could have been stopped but wasn't. A classic historical survey of a time and a people we all need to know more about, THE GUNS OF AUGUST will not be forgotten.

Protecting the world's greatest literature—not to mention keeping up with Miss Havisham—is tiring work for an expectant mother. And Thursday can definitely use a respite. So what better hideaway than inside the unread and unreadable Caversham Heights, a cliché-ridden pulp mystery in the hidden depths of the Well of Lost Plots, where all unpublished books reside?

But peace and quiet remain elusive for Thursday, who soon discovers that the Well itself is a veritable linguistic free-for-all, where grammasites run rampant, plot devices are hawked on the black market, and lousy books—like Caversham Heights—are scrapped for salvage. To top it off, a murderer is stalking Jurisfiction personnel and nobody is safe—least of all Thursday.

Henry David Thoreau's masterwork, Walden, is a collection of his reflections on life and society. His simple but profound musings—as well as Civil Disobedience, his protest against the government's interference with civil liberty—have inspired many to embrace his philosophy of individualism and love of nature.

James Herriot's All Things Bright and Beautiful: The Warm and Joyful Memoirs of the World's Most Beloved Animal Doctor is the second volume in the multimillion copy bestselling series. This edition brings to life Herriot's experiences as a veterinarian in the Yorkshire Dales, filled with humor, compassion, and love of life.

Now newly married, Herriot journeys among the remote hillside farms and valley towns of the Yorkshire Dales, caring for their inhabitants—both two- and four-legged. His deep compassion, humor, and love of life shine out as we laugh, cry, and delight in his portraits of his many, varied animal patients and their equally varied owners.

Breaking the Rules

Just when fifteen-year-old Bobby Pendragon thinks he understands his purpose as a Traveler — to protect the territories of Halla from the evil Saint Dane — he is faced with an impossible choice.

The inhabitants of Eelong are in danger of being wiped out by a mysterious plague. The only way Bobby can stop it is to bring the antidote from another territory. Since moving items between territories is forbidden by the Traveler rules, if Bobby chooses to save Eelong he could endanger himself, his friends, and the future of every other being in Halla.

Bride McTierney has had it with men. They're cheap, self-centered, and never love her for who she is. But though she prides herself on being independent, deep down she still yearns for a knight in shining armor.

She just never expected her knight in shining armor to have a shiny coat of fur...

Deadly and tortured, Vane Kattalakis isn't what he seems. Most women lament that their boyfriends are dogs. In Bride's case, hers is a wolf. A Were-Hunter wolf. Wanted dead by his enemies, Vane isn't looking for a mate. But the Fates have marked Bride as his. Now he has three weeks to either convince Bride that the supernatural is real or he will spend the rest of his life neutered—something no self-respecting wolf can accept...

But how does a wolf convince a human to trust him with her life when his enemies are out to end his? In the world of the Were-Hunters, it really is dog-eat-dog. And only one alpha male can win.

"When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."

In this final collection of Sherlock Holmes adventures, the intrepid detective and his faithful companion Dr. Watson examine and solve twelve cases that puzzle clients, baffle the police, and provide readers with the thrill of the chase.

These mysteries involve an illustrious client, a Sussex vampire, the problems of Thor Bridge and of the Lion's Mane, a creeping man, and the three-gabled house. All these cases test the bravery of Dr. Watson and the brilliant mind of Mr. Sherlock Holmes, the greatest detective we have ever known.

How do you find a new way to approach a story as familiar as any in the English language? If you're Jack Whyte, you begin your retelling of the Arthurian saga by taking one giant step backward to the latter days of the Roman Empire in Britain, sometime between the first breaching of Hadrian's Wall and the legendary days of King Arthur.

Publius Varrus is the last legionnaire in Britain, and The Skystone is in many ways his story. He is a common man with aristocratic friends, and successful both as a soldier and an ironsmith. As the Roman world slowly crumbles around them, and Publius becomes involved in a political and personal vendetta, he and his friends seek to establish a refuge, a valley where the old Roman virtues will be kept alive and the empire's many faults be avoided.

A finely crafted historical novel, The Skystone pays close attention to the details of everyday life in fourth-century Britain. As the first book in Whyte's Camulod Chronicles, it makes few allusions to the usual details of the Arthurian legends until Publius comes into contact with a sword, a stone, a lake, and a Celtic tribe who name themselves Pendragon.

Contempt is a brilliant and unsettling work by one of the revolutionary masters of modern European literature. All the qualities for which Alberto Moravia is justly famous—his cool clarity of expression, his exacting attention to psychological complexity and social pretension, his still-striking openness about sex—are evident in this story of a failing marriage.

Contempt (which was to inspire Jean-Luc Godard’s no-less-celebrated film) is an unflinching examination of desperation and self-deception in the emotional vacuum of modern consumer society.

High school junior Jenny Greenley is so good at keeping secrets that she's the school newspaper's anonymous advice columnist. She's so good at it that, when hotter-than-hot Hollywood star Luke Striker comes to her small town to research a role, Jenny is the one in charge of keeping his identity under wraps.

But Luke doesn't make it easy, and soon everyone—the town, the paparazzi, and the tabloids alike—know his secret... and Jenny is caught right in the middle of all the chaos.

Nothing in Lakshmi's childhood, running carefree and barefoot on the sun-baked earth amid the coconut and mango trees of Ceylon, could have prepared her for what life was to bring her. At fourteen, she finds herself traded in marriage to a stranger across the ocean in the fascinating land of Malaysia. Duped into thinking her new husband is wealthy, she instead finds herself struggling to raise a family with a man too impractical to face reality in a world that is, by turns, unyielding and amazing, brutal and beautiful.

Giving birth to a child every year until she is nineteen, Lakshmi becomes a formidable matriarch, determined to wrest from the world a better life for her daughters and sons and to face every new challenge with almost mythic strength. By sheer willpower, Lakshmi survives the nightmare of World War II and the Japanese occupation — but not unscathed. The family bears deep scars on its back and, in turn, inflicts those wounds on the next generation.

But it is not until Lakshmi's great-granddaughter, Nisha, pieces together the mosaic of her family history that the legacy of the Rice Mother bears fruit. Dreamy and lyrical, told in the alternating voices of the men and women of this amazing family, The Rice Mother gorgeously evokes a world where small pleasures offset unimaginable horrors, where ghosts and gods walk hand in hand.

Housekeeping is the story of Ruth and her younger sister, Lucille, who grow up haphazardly, first under the care of their competent grandmother, then of two comically bumbling great-aunts, and finally of Sylvie, their eccentric and remote aunt. The family house is in the small Far West town of Fingerbone, set on a glacial lake, the same lake where their grandfather died in a spectacular train wreck, and their mother drove off a cliff to her death. It is a town chastened by an outsized landscape and extravagant weather, and chastened again by an awareness that the whole of human history had occurred elsewhere. Ruth and Lucille's struggle toward adulthood beautifully illuminates the price of loss and survival, and the dangerous and deep undertow of transience.

The Captain's Verses is a celebration of love, ecstasy, devotion, and fury, capturing all the erotic energy of a new love. First published anonymously in 1952, these poems were addressed to Matilde Urrutia, the one with "the fire / of an unchained meteor," some years before Pablo Neruda married her.

This bilingual edition is considered by many as the most intimate and passionate volume of Neruda's love poetry.

In his new work, Michel Houellebecq combines erotic provocation with a terrifying vision of a world teetering between satiety and fanaticism, to create one of the most shocking, hypnotic, and intelligent novels in years.

In his early forties, Michel Renault skims through his days with as little human contact as possible. But following his father’s death, he takes a group holiday to Thailand where he meets a travel agent—the shyly compelling Valérie—who begins to bring this half-dead man to life with sex of escalating intensity and audacity.

Arcing with dreamlike swiftness from Paris to Pattaya Beach and from sex clubs to a terrorist massacre, Platform is a brilliant, apocalyptic masterpiece by a man who is widely regarded as one of the world’s most original and daring writers.

Part-time student, full-time Soul Reaper, Ichigo is one of the chosen few guardians of the afterlife. Ichigo Kurosaki never asked for the ability to see ghosts—he was born with the gift. When his family is attacked by a Hollow—a malevolent lost soul—Ichigo becomes a Soul Reaper, dedicating his life to protecting the innocent and helping the tortured spirits themselves find peace. Find out why Tite Kubo’s Bleach has become an international manga smash-hit!

Ichigo Kurosaki has always been able to see ghosts, but this ability doesn't change his life nearly as much as his close encounter with Rukia Kuchiki, a Soul Reaper and member of the mysterious Soul Society. While fighting a Hollow, an evil spirit that preys on humans who display psychic energy, Rukia attempts to lend Ichigo some of her powers so that he can save his family; but much to her surprise, Ichigo absorbs every last drop of her energy. Now a full-fledged Soul Reaper himself, Ichigo quickly learns that the world he inhabits is one full of dangerous spirits and, along with Rukia—who is slowly regaining her powers—it's Ichigo's job to protect the innocent from Hollows and help the spirits themselves find peace.

No good deed goes unpunished... Captain Pausert thought his luck had finally turned — but he did not yet realize it was a turn for the worse. On second thought, make that a turn for the disastrous.

Unlucky in love, unsuccessful in business, he thought he had finally made good with his battered starship Venture, cruising around the fringes of the Empire and successfully selling off odd-ball cargoes which no one else had been able to sell. He was all set to return home, where his true love was faithfully waiting for him ... he hoped.

But then he made the fatal mistake of freeing three slave children from their masters (who were suspiciously eager to part with them). They were just trying to be helpful, but those three adorable little girls quickly made Pausert the mortal enemy of his fiancée, his home planet, the Empire, warlike Sirians, psychopathic Uldanians, the dread pirate chieftain Laes Yango — and even the Worm World, the darkest threat to mankind in all of space.

And all because those harmless-looking little girls were in fact three of the notorious and universally feared Witches of Karres.

Pregnant and secretly married, Cheryl Anway scribbles what becomes her last will and testament on a school binder shortly before a rampaging trio of misfit classmates gun her down in a high school cafeteria.

Overrun with paranoia, teenage angst, and religious zeal in the massacre's wake, this sleepy suburban neighborhood declares its saints, brands its demons, and moves on. But for a handful of people still reeling from that horrific day, life remains permanently derailed.

Four dramatically different characters tell their stories: Cheryl, who calmly narrates her own death; Jason, the boy no one knew was her husband, still marooned ten years later by his loss; Heather, the woman trying to love the shattered Jason; and Jason's father, Reg, whose rigid religiosity has separated him from nearly everyone he loves.

Hey Nostradamus! is an unforgettable portrait of people wrestling with spirituality and with sorrow and its acceptance.