Wanda McCaddon

One of Jane Austen's most profound works, Mansfield Park is a subtle, moving examination of the contrast between superficial charm and true integrity. It tells the story of shy, vulnerable Fanny Price, brought up by rich relations at Mansfield Park with only her cousin Edmund as an ally. When a glamorous couple, Mary Crawford and her brother Henry, arrive from London, their charisma and reckless taste for flirtation dazzle everyone except Fanny, putting...

"I am Wistala. Wistala the great dragon huntress, a silent green avenger, dropping from the clouds..."Such is the mettle of young Wistala, one of four dragons born high in the mountains, as she breaks free of her shell. The last of a dying breed, the siblings learn of their legacy from their devoted mother and protective father-until the fateful day when their dark sanctuary is invaded by a group of slave-trading dwarves.Pushed to freedom by their...

Introduction by Joyce Carol Oates • Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s The Great American Read
Initially published under the pseudonym Currer Bell in 1847, Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyreerupted onto the English literary scene, immediately winning the devotion of many of the world’s most renowned writers, including William Makepeace Thackeray, who declared...

"The Return of the Soldier" is British author Rebecca West's remarkable 1918 novel of the struggle of a World War I veteran and the three women who love him as he returns home and tries make sense of the life that he had before he went to war. Told from the perspective of his cousin Jenny, who lives with him and his wife Kitty, it is the story of British soldier Chris Baldry, who has just returned home from fighting in France. Chris has amnesia and...

Traces the story of a scandalous trial that rocked Victorian England, describing how Isabella Robinson recorded sexual fantasies in her private diary, which was discovered and read by her husband, who petitioned for divorce on the grounds of adultery.

Walter Pater (1839-1894) attained a B.A. degree in Classics from Queen's College, Oxford, followed soon after by a M.A. degree from Brasenose College, Oxford, where he was made a Fellow in 1865. That same year Pater toured Italy, where he discovered what would become a lifelong passion for masters of the Italian Renaissance like Leonardo da Vinci, Sandro Botticelli, Michelangelo, among many others. In 1877 he published "The Renaissance: Studies in...

Charles Dickens and Nelly Ternan met in 1857; she was 18, a hard-working actress performing in his production of The Frozen Deep, and he was 45, the most lionized writer in England. Out of their meeting came a love affair that lasted thirteen years and destroyed Dickens’s marriage while effacing Nelly Ternan from the public record.
 
In this remarkable work of biography and scholarly reconstruction, the acclaimed biographer...

Deronda, a high-minded young man searching for his path in life, finds himself drawn by a series of dramatic encounters into two contrasting worlds: the English country-house life of Gwendolen Harleth, a high-spirited beauty trapped in an oppressive marriage, and the very different lives of a poor Jewish girl, Mirah, and her family. As Deronda uncovers the long-hidden secret of his own parentage, Eliot's moving and suspenseful narrative opens up a...

Mystery author Josephine Tey once again becomes embroiled in a real-life investigation in this “terrific . . . elegant” historical British mystery set in 1930s England (San Francisco Book Review)
 
Called to the peaceful wooded churchyard of St-John’s-at-Hampstead, Detective Chief Inspector Archie Penrose faces one of the most audacious and unusual murders of his career. The body of the church’s organist...

Intrepid writer and amateur sleuth Josephine Tey returns in this sixth installment of Nicola Upson's popular series—perfect for fans of Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot and Jaqueline Winspear's Maisie Dobbs—that unfolds in 1930s London as England prepares to crown a new king.

London, 1937. Following the gloomy days of the abdication of King Edward VIII, the entire city is elated to welcome King George. Just one of the many planned

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