The Markets of Paris is a remarkable work, and is the one which Zola calls his very best novel, and of which he is far more proud than of any others in his Rougon-Marquart series – prouder than of L’Assommoir. It must have been in his early manhood, when poor and friendless, he lived among the people, that much of the information which makes these pages so startlingly vivid, was acquired. How many mornings, long before dawn, must he have visited these markets – how many hours and days must he have spent there, to have mastered the habits, manners and ways of these people, who are a class by themselves, and of whom we do not lose sight, from the beginning to the end of the book...

“The Jolly Parisiennes” by Émile Zola is a very clever, brilliant and interesting romance of a “grande passion” with an undercurrent of political intrigue. The plot is ingenious both in conception and execution, while the tone of the novel is exceedingly bright and vivacious. A peculiar phase of Parisian society is most agreeably dealt with. The heroines, Louise Neigeon and Berthe Gaucheraud, are very jolly ladies indeed, but they never forget that they are ladies, even in their merriest and most eccentric moods...

Magic Words is a Victorian tale of a community and how a few women bring a special kind of Christmas magic to the community-- Magic that can heal wounded hearts. (Introduction by Sean McGaughey)

If you're a Jane Austen fan, you'll enjoy Emily Eden's comic novels of manners, The Semi-Detached House (1859) and The Semi-Attached Couple (1860). At the opening of The Semi-Detached House, the beautiful (but rather petulant) Lady Blanche Chester, newly married and pregnant, is being installed in a suburban house while her husband is away. Her encounters with her neighbors, and the intrigues of the neighborhood, soon come to absorb and annoy her.

Young and beautiful Helen Eskdale and fabulously wealthy Lord Teviot seem to be the perfect match. But when they marry, they find that misunderstandings and jealousies continually drive them apart. The machinations and intrigues of a large supporting cast surround the central question of whether their marriage will survive. Emily Eden's comedy of manners is reminiscient of Jane Austen's witty and ironic novels.

This historical novel is set in the 1100s in France and Jerusalem, following the First Crusade. Part of the story of Guy of Lusignan is told through the eyes of his fictional sister, Elaine. Guy travels to the Holy Land to reclaim it from the Saracens. Elaine follows afterward, finding upon arrival that her brother has fallen in love with Sybil, the sister of the leper king of Jerusalem. Queen Sybilla, a real historical character, is surrounded by political intrigue as she prepares to ascend the throne, which threatens her upcoming marriage to Guy of Lusignan...

Honora Klaper is beautiful, distinguished, smart, and charming. A woman who turns heads. She is on an errand. No, it is not an errand to get a man. No, it is not an errand to make money. It is a revolutionary errand: to get an education! Not just "an education", she wants to be educated in Cambridge University. Set in a time when education of women was uncommon, and written by a lady who was educated in Cambridge herself, this book tells about the rewards and the struggles of a woman to win an education. - Summary by Stav Nisser.

Chicago, May 4, 1886. In the Haymarket region of the city, a peaceful Labor Day demonstration suddenly turns into a riot. The police intervene to maintain peace, but they soon use violence to quell the mob and a bomb is thrown, resulting in death and injuries to scores of people. In the widely publicized trial that followed, eight anarchists were condemned to death or life imprisonment, convicted of conspiracy, though none of them had actually thrown the bomb. A young Russian immigrant, Emma Goldman, had arrived just the previous year in the United States...

On a dark and story night, the Coombers find a little girl. Who is she?

Written by Baroness Orczy and first published in 1919, The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel is a sequel book to the classic adventure tale, The Scarlet Pimpernel. The book consists of eleven short stories about Sir Percy Blakeney’s exploits in rescuing various aristos and French citizens from the clutches of the guillotine. The stories which are listed below, are set in 1793 but appear in no particular order. They occasionally refer to events in other books in the series.

Ruth Levice, the daughter of a rich San Francisco Jewish merchant, meats Dr. Herbert Kemp, and they slowly fall in love. However, she is Jewish and he is not. Can love overcome such an obstacle? And what is more important, duty or love?

Enid Yandell (October 6, 1870 - June 13, 1934) was an American sculptor who studied with Auguste Rodin and Frederick William MacMonnies. She created numerous portraits, garden pieces and small works as well as public monuments. Ms. Yandell also studied in Paris and kept a studio there. This book, Three Girls in a Flat, is a semi-autobiographical account of her work as a sculptor for the Horticultural Building at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. Co-written with two friends, it's an episodic account of the trials and tribulations of three young women eking out a living while sharing a small flat in Chicago...

This collection from Darker Projects brings the Star Trek series back to life with a fictional account of our universe on the brink of war. With stakes running high a splinter group decides to take on the most morally dubious missions and bring us the listeners along for the ride. Sometimes in war there are no good options and this series explores those darker decisions that don't have to be made in everyday life. The story is action packed and goes at light speed jumping around the universe always keeping in the center of the action and outwitting the enemy.

This story begins after a long and devastating war that has left The Federation in shambles. The pressing mission for the remaining ships in Star Fleet is to travel the war-torn galaxy's and find old alleys to reunite under one federation. Many of the classic Star Trek races make an appearance in this series including the Klingons, Romulans and everyone's favorite the Borg! This book is fast paced and a very creative read. It comes recommended highly for anyone who has followed Star Trek and it also fills in a good amount of background information for those less well versed in the subject.

Ernest Bramah is mainly known for his ‘Kai Lung’ books – Dorothy L Sayers often used quotes from them for her chapter headings. In his lifetime however he was equally well known for his detective stories. Since Sherlock Holmes we have had French detectives, Belgian detectives, aristocratic detectives, royal detectives, ecclesiastical detectives, drunken detectives and even a (very) few quite normal happily married detectives. Max Carrados was however probably the first blind detective.

Max Carrados is a blind detective who has developed his own remaining senses to a superior level and who has enlisted the superior observations skills of his butler to fill in for any deficiency of his own. His visual deficiency is no obstacle to solving the most difficult cases. As with some better known sleuths, Mr. Carrados' feats amaze, entertain and satisfy.

The Wallet of Kai Lung is a collection of fantasy stories by Ernest Bramah, all but the last of which feature Kai Lung, an itinerant story-teller of ancient China. The collection's importance in the history of fantasy literature was recognized by the anthologization of two of its tales in the celebrated Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series.