Short Classics

A novella set in the hard-scrabble world of James S. A. Corey's NYT-bestselling Expanse series, Gods of Risk tells the story of Bobbie Draper following the events of Caliban's War. HUGO AWARD WINNER FOR BEST SERIES As tension between Mars and Earth mounts, and terrorism plagues the Martian city...

This book won a World Fantasy Award. It's remarkable: The stories are rich, fascinating stuff - creepy and unsettling and phantasmic. Imagine what Tolkien's Lord of the Rings would have been like if Tolkien had tried to tell that story sympathetically from the point of view of the human denizens of Mordor and you'll have the slightest sense of what you're about to wade into... but only just a sense.

Read the best mystery and adventure short stories. Be it cozy, historical, detective or murder mystery stories; our collection includes them all: The Red-Headed League by Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle by Arthur Conan Doyle, The Arrow of Heaven by G. K. Chesterton, The Sign of the Broken Sword by G. K. Chesterton, The Purloined Letter by Edgar Allan Poe, The Master of Mystery by Jack London.

Guy de Maupassant is widely regarded as the father of the modern short story. As his 13 volumes of short stories attest, he was a prolific writer of this form. He had a simple, efficient style of writing and, like Anton Chekhov, found inspiration for his stories in the day-to-day lives of characters, in which their hidden natures are often revealed. Many of his works also centered on the Franco-Prussian War, in which he served.

El Regalo de los Reyes Magos es una tierna historia de amor e ironía navideña. En ella, una pareja joven y empobrecida, Della y Jim, desean fervientemente comprar regalos perfectos el uno para el otro. En un giro conmovedor del destino, Della vende su hermosa cabellera para comprar una cadena para el reloj de Jim, mientras él vende su preciado reloj para comprar peinetas para el pelo de Della.

A chilling collection of Ray Bradbury short stories, The October Country combines dark fantasy, classic horror stories, imaginative tales, and gripping mystery and suspense, offering an unforgettable exploration of the human soul's darkest corners. “That country where it is always turning late...

The definitive short story collection that established Ernest Hemingway's literary reputation, originally published in 1938. Ernest Hemingway is a cultural icon—an archetype of rugged masculinity, a romantic ideal of the intellectual in perpetual exile—but, to his countless readers...

Algernon Blackwood, a journalist and broadcast narrator, was one of the most prolific writers of ghost stories in the history of the genre. The title story, "The Touch of Pan", explores the lingering presence of myth in everyday life. In "The Glamour of the Snow", Blackwood winds a tale about a man's infatuation with a supernatural winter beauty. In "The Attic", the ghost of an usurer haunts the old Chateaux and, on the anniversary of a young boy's death, the boy's cat brings the family together. "The Willows" follows two campers who are on a canoe trip down the Danube.

Perhaps Blackwood's most celebrated story, The Willows was influenced heavily by his own trips down the Danube River. It tells the story of two campers who pick the wrong place to sleep for the night, a place where another dimension impinges on our own. H.P. Lovecraft considered this the finest supernatural tale in English literature.

Tadeusz Borowski’s concentration camp stories were based on his own experiences surviving Auschwitz and Dachau. In spare, brutal prose he describes a world where where the will to survive overrides compassion, and prisoners eat, work, and sleep a few yards from where others are murdered; where the difference between human beings is reduced to a second bowl of soup, an extra blanket, or the luxury of a pair of shoes with thick soles; and where the line between normality and abnormality vanishes.

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.

Written initially in French, later translated by the author into English, Molloy is the first book in Dublin-born Samuel Beckett's trilogy. It was published shortly after WWII and marked a new, mature writing style, which was to dominate the remainder of his working life. Molloy is less a novel than a set of two monologues narrated by Molloy and his pursuer, Moran.

Sometimes a journey can be of discovery. And in this compilation, Ruskin Bond has discovered hair-raising stories of other people's journeys taken many, many years ago. Bond describes the old track from Rajpur to Mussorie, surrounded by oak trees and colonial buildings in 'The Kipling Road'. Braving blizzards and bandits, M. Huc takes a momentous journey to Ladakh in 'Journey to the Forbidden City', while Osa Johnson, the only woman adventurer in the book, gives her awe-inspiring account of cannibals in 'A Woman Among Cannibals'.

Written with stark realism and psychological depth, A Devil of a Fellow is a powerful portrait of masculinity, desire, and accountability in early-20th-century coastal New England—where charm can wound as deeply as cruelty, and redemption comes at a price.

Arthur Conan Doyle was the greatest genre writer Britain has ever produced. Throughout a long writing career, he drew on his own medical background, his travels, and his increasing interest in spiritualism and the occult to produce a spectacular array of Gothic tales. Many of Doyle's writings are recognized as the very greatest tales of terror. They range from hauntings in the polar wasteland to evil surgeons and malevolent jungle landscapes. This collection brings together over 30 of Conan Doyle's best Gothic tales

Queen Marguerite de Navarre was one of the most powerful women of her age. Her masterpiece, The Heptameron, is a collection of some 72 stories told by five gentlemen and five ladies who find themselves stranded in an abbey. Proposed as an edifying way of passing the time while a bridge is being repaired, the tale-telling - as well as the conversations that follow each story - quickly becomes a battle of wits between the sexes, with tales concerning illicit lovers, romantic conquests, lecherous monks, manly honor, and women's virtue.

Universally acclaimed as the maestro of horror and the morbid, Edgar Allan Poe’s dark gift has for more than a century and a half set the standard for the genre. Now, Caedmon Audio presents a classic collection of Poe’s most terrifying tales performed by two of the most brilliant...

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.

Paru en 1887 avec d'autres récits, "Le Horla" est incontestablement le plus original et le plus effrayant de tous les contes fantastiques de Maupassant. Pour l'écrire, l'auteur s'est documenté auprès du docteur Charcot, célèbre spécialiste des névroses et des hystéries. Mais surtout, il s'est probablement inspiré des troubles nerveux qui commençaient alors à le détruire et qui allaient bientôt l'empoter.

Author Peter Ackroyd has won the Somerset Maugham Award, the Whitbread Novel of the Year, and the Guardian Fiction Prize, and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Based on Geoffrey Chaucer’s immortal work, this retelling of The Canterbury Tales follows a party of travelers as they tell stories amongst themselves about love and chivalry, saints and legends, travel and adventure. Through allegory, satire, and humor, the tales help pass the time during their journey.