Catalog Search Results
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
Growing up as an orphan, Razumou adopted the belief that all of Russia was his family, a sentiment that he carries into his higher education. Because of this, when talks of revolution start arising in Russia, Razumou decides to stay neutral. However, this becomes increasingly difficult when most of his classmates start to express their ardent support for a revolution. Still, Razumou decides not to take a stand on either side. Since he feels all of...
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
Russian literature's first major prose novel, this gripping work was a primary influence on Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, and other great nineteenth-century writers. Mikhail Lermontov, "the poet of the Caucasus," drew upon his personal Byronic exploits to create these tales of treachery, abductions, and sexual intrigue. Published in 1840, one year before the author's death at age twenty-six in a duel, the novel retains its overwhelming power and fascination....
Author
Series
Language
English
Formats
Description
The Red and the Black is the Bildungsroman of Julien Sorel, the intelligent and ambitious protagonist. He comes from a poor family and fails to understand much about the ways of the world he sets out to conquer. He harbours many romantic illusions, but becomes mostly a pawn in the political machinations of the ruthless and influential people about him. The adventures of the hero satirize early 19th-century French society, especially the hypocrisy...
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
First published in 1852, "The Blithedale Romance" is the third of Nathaniel Hawthorne's romantic novels. Set in the utopian communal farm called Blithedale in the 1840's, the novel tells the story of four inhabitants of the commune: Hollingsworth, a misogynist philanthropist obsessed with turning Blithedale into a colony for the reformation of criminals; Zenobia, a passionate feminist; Priscilla, a mysterious lady with a hidden agenda who turns out...
5) Martin Eden
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
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...
6) Resurrection
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
With an Introduction by Anthony Briggs Translated by Louise Maude This powerful novel, Tolstoy's third major masterpiece, after War and Peace and Anna Karenina, begins with a courtroom drama (the finest in Russian literature) all the more stunning for being based on a real-life event. Dmitri Nekhlyudov, called to jury service, is astonished to see in the dock, charged with murder, a young woman whom he once seduced, propelling her into prostitution....
Author
Series
Language
English
Formats
Description
When her father has a crisis of conscious, Margaret Hale's life is turned upside down. Because her parents decide to move away from southern London, Margaret must leave behind the tranquil, rural life she's always known to settle in an industrial town called Milton. Though she does her best to assimilate, Margaret cannot help but feel trapped and hopeless in Milton, as she witnesses the brutal effects industrialization has on the environment and the...
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
This classic tragicomic tale from George Barr McCutcheon transforms everyone's favorite caviar-and-champagne dream into a soul-shaking test of mistrust and reckless spending Popular, good-looking, and enterprising, Montgomery Brewster is the toast of New York. While celebrating his twenty-fifth birthday among friends, Monty receives word that his grandfather has died. Before long, New York is abuzz with the news. When Monty inherits $1 million from...
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
"The Mayor of Casterbridge" is an 1886 novel by the legendary English writer Thomas Hardy. One of Hardy's "Wessex" novel (a fictional region of Britain that Hardy invented), the book is generally acknowledged as one of the author's masterpieces.
The story, set in the town of Casterbridge, concerns a married young farmer named Michael Henchard who, one drunken night, auctions off his wife Susan and baby daughter Elizabeth-Jane to a passing sailor,...
10) The Warden
Author
Series
Chronicles of Barsetshire volume 1
Language
English
Formats
Description
The first novel of Trollope's Chronicles of Barsetshire series, this work introduces the fictional cathedral town of Barchester and many of its clerical inhabitants. Originally published in 1855, the story centers on Mr. Septimus Harding who has been granted the comfortable wardenship of Hiram's Hospital, an almshouse from a medieval charity of the diocese. Mr. Harding, a fundamentally good man and an excellent musician, conscientiously fulfills his...
Author
Series
Language
English
Description
Tremendous Trifles is comprised of 39 chapters, each functioning as their own essay or story. With whimsical, light-hearted prose, vivid figurative language, and unparalleled insight, Chesterton covers a variety of philosophical principles of everyday life. Chesterton often used ordinary events and objects to explain deeper matters. Using relatable and accessible examples, Tremendous Trifles also test biases and preconceived ideas, specifically in...
12) De Profundis
Author
Series
Language
English
Formats
Description
Oscar Wilde's emotionally raw manuscript details the inner turmoil surrounding his relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas following his controversial arrest and conviction for gross indecency It's an honest and intimate look at the author in his most vulnerable state.
Oscar Wilde spent two years in prison from 1895 to 1897. It was during this time that he wrote a 50,000-word letter to his former lover and friend, Lord Alfred Douglas. Published under...
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
A forerunner of psychological fiction, and considered a landmark work for its innovative use of narrative devices, Tristram Shandy was both celebrated and vilified when first published in 1759. While the narrative's endless digressions drew criticism, the novel's bawdy humor made it a cause for celebration in eighteenth-century London. Originally released in nine separate volumes, it is literature's famed "cock and bull" story, reveling in parody...
14) Dead Souls
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
First published in 1842, "Dead Souls" is the story of Chichikov, a young middle-class gentleman who comes to a small town in Russia with a dubious plan to improve his wealth and position in life. He begins by spending beyond his means on the premise that he can impress the local officials and gain standing and connections in the community. At the heart of his plan is the idea of acquiring "dead souls" or more explicitly serfs of landowners who have...
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
One of the major works of fiction written during the twentieth century, D. H. Lawrence's last novel is an erotic celebration of life. Described by the New York Times as "our time's most significant romance," the controversial book was banned, burned, and the subject of a landmark obscenity trial. Printed privately in Florence in 1928, it was not published in Great Britain until 1960, after having long scandalized society with its sexually explicit...
16) Captain Blood
Author
Series
Language
English
Formats
Description
Captain Blood is an adventure novel by Rafael Sabatini.
The protagonist is the sharp-witted Dr. Peter Blood, a fictional Irish physician who had had a wide-ranging career as a soldier and sailor (including a commission as a captain under the Dutch admiral De Ruyter) before settling down to practice medicine in the town of Bridgwater in Somerset.
The book opens with him attending to his geraniums while the town prepares to fight for the Duke of Monmouth....
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
"When it comes to walking the mean streets, Dickens could give modern genre authors the tour of their lives." -Marilyn Stasio, The New York Times
When a corpse is found in the Thames River and identified as John Harmon, many lives will be forever changed. John, who had been abroad and estranged from his miserly father for years, will no longer collect his inheritance. It will instead go to the miser's employees, Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, transforming...
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
This lighthearted farce features an American under the spell of Britain's aristocracy and an English earl equally intrigued by American democracy. While eccentric inventor Colonel Mulberry Sellers attempts to pursue his claim to the earldom of Rossmore, the rightful heir determines to renounce his title and find a place in American society. When the young lord's identity is wiped out in a hotel fire, he's free to assume a new name and realize his...
19) Pericles
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
Likely written around 1607 or 1608 and attributed at least in part to Shakespeare, "Pericles, Prince of Tyre" is an adventure-filled play that follows the extended sailing journeys of a young prince. Pericles, a young prince from Phoenicia, is forced to flee Antioch when he correctly guesses a riddle that reveals the incestuous activity of King Antiochus. Unable to stay at home in Tyre because of Antiochus' vengeance, he sails away and ends up shipwrecked...
Author
Accelerated Reader
IL: UG - BL: 7.1 - AR Pts: 5
Language
English
Formats
Description
"On Friday noon, July the twentieth, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipitated five travelers into the gulf below." With this celebrated sentence, Thornton Wilder begins The Bridge of San Luis Rey, one of the towering achievements in American fiction and a novel read throughout the world. By chance, a monk witnesses the tragedy. Brother Juniper seeks to prove that it was divine intervention rather than chance that led to the deaths...
In Interlibrary Loan
Didn't find what you need? Items not owned by Penticton Public Library can be requested from other Interlibrary Loan libraries to be delivered to your local library for pickup. Items must be over 1 year old.
Didn't find it?
Can't find what you are looking for? Try our Materials Request Service for new books published this year. Submit Request