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First appearing as an anonymous serial in "Harper’s Magazine" in 1895, “Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc” was Mark Twain’s final novel and was published as a complete work under his name in 1896. The novel is a stark departure from Twain’s usual comic and satirical writings, which is why Twain insisted it initially be published anonymously so that the public would take it seriously. The work is told from the perspective of a fictionalized...
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"A deeply evocative portrait of Isabella Stewart Gardner, a daring visionary who created an inimitable legacy in American art and transformed the city of Boston itself. By the time Isabella Stewart Gardner opened her Italian palazzo-style home as a museum in 1903 to showcase her collection of old masters, antiques, and objects d'art, she was already well-known for scandalizing Boston's polite society. But when Isabella first arrives in Boston in 1861,...
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Death in Venice (German: Der Tod in Venedig) is a novella written by the German author Thomas Mann published in 1912. The work presents a great writer who visits Venice and is liberated, uplifted, and then increasingly obsessed by the sight of a stunningly beautiful youth.
Tadzio, the boy in the story, is the nickname for the Polish name Tadeusz and is based on a boy Mann had seen during his visit to Venice in 1911.
As the story opens, he is strolling...
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Clara Kelley is not who they think she is. She's not the experienced Irish maid who was hired to work in one of Pittsburgh's grandest households. She's a poor farmer's daughter with nowhere to go and nothing in her pockets. But the other woman with the same name has vanished, and pretending to be her just might get Clara some money to send back home. If she can keep up the ruse, that is. Serving as a lady's maid in the household of Andrew Carnegie...
5) Martin Eden
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Martin Eden (1909) is a novel by American writer Jack London. The book follows the tradition of the Künstlerroman, a narrative that traces the life and development of an artist, to tell the story of a young man not unlike London himself. Part fiction, part autobiography, Martin Eden examines the consequences of dreams and achievements, successes and failures, for a young artist struggling with fame. The novel is heavily influenced by London's socialist...
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"In April 1938, a man calling himself Josef Hofmann arrives at a boarding house in Hamm, Germany, and lets a room from the widow who owns it. Fifty years later, Walter Gersdorff, the widow's son, who was eleven years old in the spring of 1938, discovers the carefully hidden diary the boarder had kept during his stay, even though he should never have written any of its contents down. What Walter finds is a scathing chronicle of one the most tumultuous...
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In a compelling, richly researched novel that draws from thousands of letters and original sources, bestselling authors Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie tell the fascinating, untold story of Thomas Jefferson's eldest daughter, Martha "Patsy" Jefferson Randolph-a woman who kept the secrets of our most enigmatic founding father and shaped an American legacy.
From her earliest days, Patsy Jefferson knows that though her father loves his family dearly,...
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For an ambitious, keenly intelligent woman, lying proves to be the easiest way to get through life, in this Victorian-era classic. Lizzie Greystock is a woman of rare cunning and determination-both of which she uses to better her lot in life. This is especially true when she manages to convince the ailing Sir Florian Eustace to marry her shortly before his demise, leaving Lizzie both a wealthy widow and the mother to Florian's young son. A born...
9) Phineas Finn
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An adventurous Irishman sets out to find his fortune among proper English society in this classic novel from Anthony Trollope. Sent to London to become a lawyer, young Phineas Finn proves himself to be a disappointing student but truly gifted in the ways of charm, culture, and fine appearance. It is the discovery of these talents that ultimately leads him to what he believes is his true calling: English Parliament. Through sheer luck and pluck, dashing,...
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The Moon and Sixpence (1919) is a novel by W. Somerset Maugham. Inspired by the life of French painter Paul Gauguin, Maugham set out to capture, the disconnect between an artist's desire, to create and their obligations to their loved ones and society. Praised for its multifaceted portrayal of tortured genius and wasted talent, The Moon and Sixpence explores the distance between expectation and desire in a man whose decisions, however, hastily made,...
11) Lady Clementine
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A historical tale inspired by the life of Clementine Churchill that traces her unflinching role in protecting the life and wartime agendas of her husband, Winston Churchill.
Lady Clementine Churchill did not flinch through the sweeping darkness of war, and would not surrender either to expectations or to enemies. Her scandalous childhood, her unexpected role as a social outsider, her maternal insecurities, and the daily struggles she faced to smooth...
12) The diamond eye
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"The New York Times bestselling author of The Rose Code returns with an unforgettable World War II tale of a quiet bookworm who becomes history's deadliest female sniper. Based on a true story. In 1937 in the snowbound city of Kiev (now known as Kyiv), wry and bookish history student Mila Pavlichenko organizes her life around her library job and her young son--but Hitler's invasion of Ukraine and Russia sends her on a different path. Given a rifle...
13) Of human bondage
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"It is very difficult for a writer of my generation, if he is honest, to pretend indifference to the work of Somerset Maugham," wrote Gore Vidal. "He was always so entirely there." Originally published in 1915, Of Human Bondage is a potent expression of the power of sexual obsession and of modern man's yearning for freedom. This classic bildungsroman tells the story of Philip Carey, a sensitive boy born with a clubfoot who is orphaned and...
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Hedy Kiesler is lucky. Her beauty leads to a starring role in a controversial film and marriage to a powerful Austrian arms dealer, allowing her to evade Nazi persecution despite her Jewish heritage. But Hedy is also intelligent. At lavish Vienna dinner parties, she overhears the Third Reich's plans. One night in 1937, desperate to escape her controlling husband and the rise of the Nazis, she disguises herself and flees her husband's castle. She lands...
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"Built on the backs of those who fell before it, Julius Caesar's imperial dynasty is only as strong as the next person who seeks to control it. In the Roman Empire no one is safe from the sting of betrayal: man, woman--or child. As a boy, Nero's royal heritage becomes a threat to his very life, first when the mad emperor Caligula tries to drown him, then when his great aunt attempts to secure her own son's inheritance. Faced with shocking acts of...
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"Abé is an exquisite storyteller." —Fiona Davis, New York Times bestselling author of The Magnolia Palace
The New York Times bestselling author of The Second Mrs. Astor returns with a spellbinding new book perfect for fans of HBO's The Gilded Age and readers of Marie Benedict, Karen Harper, and Allison Pataki. This sweeping novel of historical fiction is inspired by the true rags-to-riches...
The New York Times bestselling author of The Second Mrs. Astor returns with a spellbinding new book perfect for fans of HBO's The Gilded Age and readers of Marie Benedict, Karen Harper, and Allison Pataki. This sweeping novel of historical fiction is inspired by the true rags-to-riches...
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Samuel Butler was an individualistic Victorian era writer who published a variety of works. He is also known for examining Christian orthodoxy, considerable studies of evolutionary thought, studies of Italian art, and works of literary history as well as criticism. Butler even made prose translations of "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey" which remain some of the most popular to this day. His authority on literature came through his posthumous novel, "The...
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Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy (1925) is nothing less than what the title holds it to be; it is the story of a weak-willed young man who is both villain and victim (the victim of a valueless, materialistic society) and someone who ultimately destroys himself. Dreiser modeled the story of Clyde Griffiths on a real-life murder that took place in 1906; a young social climber of considerable charm murdered his pregnant girlfriend to get her out...
20) Varina: a novel
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"Her marriage prospects limited, teenage Varina Howell agrees to wed the much-older widower Jefferson Davis, with whom she expects the secure life of a Mississippi landowner. Davis instead pursues a career in politics and is eventually appointed president of the Confederacy, placing Varina at the white-hot center of one of the darkest moments in American history"--
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