Fiction

Rodion Raskolnikov is a radical, impoverished former student, who decides to see if he can commit the perfect crime and sets out to murder an unscrupulous pawnbroker and ends up murdering her sister as well. Filled with remorse (at which he is somewhat surprised), Raskolnikov is also plagued by the appearance of the detective looking to solve the crime, Porfiry, as well as the visit to St Peters

One of the most popular characters of Victorian fiction, Sherlock Holmes returns here to take on his arch-enemy, Moriarty, in a collection of stories first published in The Strand Magazine between 1903 and 1904. This volume contains 13 classic detective stories featuring the iconic detective. ABOUT THE SERIES: Arcturus Essential Sherlock Holmes presents Arthur Conan Doyle's best-loved Holmes s

Sherlock Holmes and the faithful Dr Watson are featured here in a series of twelve of their earliest cases. They include A Scandal in Bohemia where, uniquely, Holmes is outwitted - by a beautiful woman; The Red-Headed League, which begins with a bizarre newspaper advertisement for red-haired men; and The Adventure of the Speckled Band, in which the great detective traces a sinister whistling sou

Containing one of the best known and best loved detective novels of all time - The Murders in the Rue Morgue - this entertaining collection of Poe's work shows why he was considered a master of mystery. Also included in the book is The Mystery of Marie Rogêt, which was a sequel to the thrilling Murders in the Rue Morgue, as well as three other tales of detection and adventure, including "Thou Ar

Once upon a time the brothers Grimm published a scholarly collection of folk tales, but only when they rewrote them for children did the Fairy Tales become popular. In addition to accusations of violence that led to more sanitized versions of the Tales than this 1884 translation

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Take a breathtaking journey into the spiritual landscape with a calendar featuring fantasy works by contemporary artist Josephine Wall. Dazzling artwork with swirling backgrounds, vibrant colours and otherworldly beings bring this calendar to life with the inspirational sense that anything is possible.

Jonathan Langley's life took a devastating turn when he lost his eyesight to a rare illness. Once a successful painter and printmaker, Jonathan now lives in complete darkness, rarely leaving his apartment and angry at the world. When he encounters his precocious 11-year-old neighbour, Lupe, the two form an unlikely friendship. Her cheerful presence shatters his hardened exterior, revealing a gen

Hard Times is set in Victorian England in the 1850s and the fictitious industrial city of Coketown, where Thomas Gradgrind, 'A man of realities', is obsessed with a misguided utilitarianism that insists on 'nothing but fact', without emotion or imagination.

'I always labour at the same thing, to make the sex relation valid and precious instead of shameful. And this novel is the furthest I've gone. To me it is beautiful and tender as the naked self.' - D.H. Lawrence Lady Chatterley's Lover explores the intense affair between the sexually frustrated Connie - whose husband, Clifford, is paralysed from the waist down - and Oliver Mellors, the family

A shipwreck brings Lemuel Gulliver to Lilliput, where he finds himself in a kingdom of tiny people. This experience is later reversed when he lands among the giants of Brobdingnag. And yet more contrasts lie in store for him between the Houyhnhnms - a race of noble horses - and the savage sub-human Yahoos. Gulliver's Travels has not been out of print since its publication in 1726. Readers, 'fr

Far from the Madding Crowd is perhaps the most pastoral of Hardy''s Wessex novels. It tells the story of the young farmer Gabriel Oak and his love for and pursuit of the elusive Bathsheba Everdene, whose wayward nature leads her to both tragedy and true love.

Wilkie Collins' novel is generally considered to be the first full length detective novel in the English language, but in fact it was first published in serial form in Charles Dickens' magazine All the Year Round. Written in the form of a series of letters, the story centres around a gem known as the Moonstone because of its association with the Hindu god of the moon, Chandra. ABOUT THE SERIES:

'It is a far, far better thing that I do than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known' is perhaps one of literature's most famous lines. Spoken by the dissolute barrister Sydney Carton as he goes to his death at the guillotine, it sees the end of a passionate story that moves between two great European capitals, London and Paris, before and during the F

Published in 1826, The Last of the Mohicans is an adventure story centred on the kinship between white frontiersman, Natty Bumppo - or 'Hawkeye' - and two Mohican Indians, Chingachgook and his son Uncas. The action takes place during the French and Indian War. Alice and Cora, daughters of a British fort commander, are on a perilous journey through the dark forests of western New York. Their Huron

First published in serial form in Le Gaulois, Gaston Leroux's bitter-sweet tale of love and rejection was inspired by real events that took place at the Paris Opera, now the Opera Garnier, in the 19th century. It tells the tale of the opera singer, Christine, her love for her childhood sweetheart Raoul, and the obsessions of the 'phantom', a disfigured man called Erik who lives beneath the Opera

Considered a classic of 20th century English literature Animal Farm is George Orwell's satire on the Russian Revolution of 1917 and Stalin's subsequent rule. It tells the story of the animals of Manor Farm, as they rise up against the drunken farmer Mr Jones and the ensuing leadership battle between two pigs, Snowball and Napoleon. They set in motion their 'system of thought', Animalism, a cle

Gibran's masterpiece has furnished individuals the world over with words of joy or consolation on occasions of birth, marriage, death and all of life's other milestones. The concise and deeply profound discourses cover a whole range of topics on life and the human condition, including love, children, work, delight and sorrow, reason and passion, self-knowledge, freedom, pleasure and beauty. Sta