Short Classics

Slim and Red decide to train the to small animals Red has captured as a circus act. You can imagine the chagrin of Red's father an important industrialist realizes that the small animals are actually surviving aliens who have traveled to this world to open up an interstellar trade relationship. There are lots of possibilities here, so listen along as Darla Middlebrook transports us to the world of Isaac Asimov.

Can You Forgive Her? is the first of the six Palliser novels. Here Trollope examines parliamentary election and marriage, politics and privacy. As he dissects the Victorian upper class, issues and people shed their pretenses under his patient, ironic probe.

There are certain stories which stand out from the crowd owing to the unique creativity of the plot and the skill with which the author unfolds his tale. This selection contains 50 of the most ingenious short stories ever written. Includes: 'The Lighthouse on Shivering Sand' by J. S. Fletcher; 'The Umbrella' by Arnold Bennett; 'The Lovely Lady' by D. H. Lawrence; 'The Lake' by W. F. Harvey; 'A Tiger’s Skin' by W. W. Jacobs; and 'The Strange Case of Mr. Todmorden' by F. Britten Austin.

In this romance anthology, 10 Austenesque authors sketch Pride and Prejudice heroine Elizabeth Bennet's character through a collection of re-imaginings, set in the Regency through contemporary times. In Elizabeth: Obstinate, Headstrong Girl, she bares her most intimate thoughts, all the while offering biting social commentary about life’s absurdities. Elizabeth overcomes the obstacles of others’ opinions, not to mention her own flaws, to find a love truly worthy of her - her Mr. Darcy - all with humor and her sparkling charm.

A gentleman, with the aid of a close female companion, investigates a hidden disturbance within his unconscious. This acclaimed classic short story is rendered in perfect Jamesian fashion by narrator Jonathan Epstein.

Charles Dickens is known for writing the greatest of all Christmas stories: A Christmas Carol. But few know that he wrote a number of other short stories for that holiday season. Here in one wonderful audio collection are six short stories about Christmas: "A Christmas Tree", "What Christmas Is as We Grow Older", "The Poor Relation's Story", "The Child's Story", "The Schoolboy's Story" and "Nobody's Story".

A Distant Episode contains the best of Paul Bowles's short stories, as selected by the author. An American cult figure, Bowles has fascinated such disparate talents as Norman Mailer, Allen Ginsberg, Truman Capote, William S. Burroughs, Gore Vidal, and Jay McInerney.

Witches and pixies abound in this magical selection of 30 short stories, perfect for seasonal listening and sharing. Each story stands alone and is the perfect length for listening to at bedtime or in the classroom. Enid Blyton remains one of Britain's favourite children's authors, and her bumper short-story collections are perfect for introducing her to the latest generation of listeners.

Catch the holiday spirit with this magical collection of beloved Christmas tales. Christmas favorites from L.M. Montgomery, O. Henry, Willa Cather, Hans Christian Anderson, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Mark Twain, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Bret Harte and Anthony Trollope are lovingly recorded and presented here in one enchanting volume.

Роль классической литературы в жизни каждого без исключения человека невозможно переоценить. Именно из классики мы узнаем о прошедших эпохах, традициях, быте и нормах поведения прошлого.

How easily does love turn to hate? In what is arguably one of Edgar Allen Poe's most disturbing tales, we join our narrator as he cruelly injures and betrays his once beloved cat. Our deeply disturbed narrator shows a malicious streak and lack of conscience that is painful to witness. The narrative forces us to question to what extent we can escape our conscience. As we realize all is not as it seems.

William Shakespeare is arguably the most pivotal and widely read figure in the history of English literature. This comprehensive collection highlights some of the bard’s best works, adapted to be more easily digestible for children. Featured within are some of the bard’s most famous and compelling works, including: The Comedy of Errors, Hamlet, Macbeth, The Merchant of Venice, Othello, Romeo and Juliet, The Tempest, and many more.

Edgar Allan Poe - the master of horror - was also responsible for writing the first detective stories in history. His master sleuth, the elusive logician C. Auguste Dupin, is the man the police turn to when they find themselves unable to solve a mystery. Here are two of Poe's Dupin stories in a single volume, one involving blackmail of the royal family and the other...a tale of two brutal murders in the heart of Paris!

'The Pit and the Pendulum', one of Poe's most well-renowned short stories, is centred around the torments endured by a prisoner of the Spanish Inquisition. The narrator of the story describes his experience of being tortured. The story is especially effective at inspiring fear in the listener because of its heavy focus on the senses, such as sound, emphasising its reality, unlike many of Poe's stories, which are aided by the supernatural.

Borrowing its title from an old Anglican prayer, Ernest Hemingway’s In Our Time is a series of stories and vignettes that reflect on a world searching for peace after World War I. These stories span topics from passionate affairs between soldiers and nurses to the thrills and spectacle of bullfighting. Many of the stories in the collection are presenting as counterparts to one another, playing off of similar themes with different framing techniques.

The story starts with the hotel owner trolling for guests at the train station and finding three: the Swede, the Cowboy, and the Easterner. As with many stories the personalities are known by their titles not their names; the two known by their names are the hotel keeper, Scully, and his son Johnny. The first major event is in a play for fun (no money) card game in which the Swede accuses Johnny of cheating. Johnny skillfully defends himself by saying he won't put up with the accusation, while side stepping the truth of the matter.

If you want to understand the daily life and psychology of the late Middle Ages, Ronald Ecker’s classic translation of The Canterbury Tales provides one of the very best means of doing so. Within its audio is to be found a broad range of society - high and low, male and female, rich and poor - who express their innermost beliefs and extravagant fantasies in a series of stories they tell as they make their way to Canterbury Cathedral.

Patrick Lafcadio Hearn, was an Irish writer known also by the Japanese name Koizumi Yakumo. His book Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things, comprises two parts, the first being the "Kwaidan Proper" and the second, "Insect-Studies", which consists of an essay each on ants, butterflies and mosquitos. According to the author, most of the folk tales and ghost stories in the first part were translated from old Japanese texts. The themes encompass resurrection, sacrifice, magic, and the realm of dreams.

The Virginia Woolf Complete Collection brings together all of her most iconic works, including all 9 of her published novels, a selection of her best short stories, as well as some of her most influential non-fiction writing. From the enduring importance of her ideas of female independence in A Room of One's Own to the modern masterpieces of Mrs Dalloway and To the Lighthouse, alongside many more of her novels, criticism, and essays, this collection takes you across the broad breadth of Woolf's ever-inventive and timeless writings.

Immerse yourself in a world where the illuminating Stephen Fry reads some of the more memorable short stories of our time. A brilliant combination of reader and writer come together in these short stories available on digital download.