Synopsis: The author of The Time Machine and War of the World conjures up an island where a mad doctor experiments with turning animals into grotesque human-like creatures. The island is discovered by survivors of a South Pacific shipwreck. Read the prescient 1896 story as a social satire and as a foreshadow of science-to-come such as gene-splicing and bioengineering.

"In 1917, after the entry of America into World War I, E. E. Cummings, arecent graduate of Harvard College, volunteered to serve on an ambulance corps in France. Arrived in Paris with a new friend, William Slater Brown, the two young men set about living it up in the big city before heading off to their assignment. Once in the field, they wrote irreverent letters about their experiences which attracted the attention of the censors and ultimately led...

Lady Windermere misinterprets her husband's interest in an older woman, Mrs. Erlynne, causing a rift that could lead to both marital and societal ruin. Lady Windermere's Fan Is an intriguing tale that examines intention versus outcome in a world driven by perception. Lady Windermere is a young wife who's concerned by her husband's connection to the mysterious, Mrs. Erlynne. She believes the woman is a threat to her marriage and livelihood. Despite...

West with the Night is the story of Beryl Markham--aviator, racehorse trainer, beauty--and her life in the Kenya of the 1920s and '30s.

John Dos Passos's second novel, Three Soldiers, was published in 1921 after many rejections from publishers and censorship squabbles. The novel, which was hailed as a masterpiece on its original publication, stands as one of the most grimly honest portraits of World War I. This anti-war novel focuses on three soldiers, Fuselli, an Italian American store clerk from San Francisco; Chrisfield, a farm boy from Indiana; and Andrews, a musically gifted...

The enduring appeal of the desert is strikingly portrayed in this poetic study, which has become a classic of the American Southwest. First published in 1903, it is the work of Mary Austin (1868–1934), a prolific novelist, poet, critic, and playwright, who was also an ardent early feminist and champion of Indians and Spanish-Americans. She is best known today for this enchanting paean to the vast, arid, yet remarkably beautiful lands that lie east...

The groundbreaking dystopian novel that inspired 1984 and Brave New World. "The best single work of science fiction yet written." -Ursula K. Le Guin When society has programmed you to sleep . . . How do you wake yourself up? The One State is a world where people are merely numbers, and free will itself is a disease. Most are happy in their role as cogs in a huge machine, controlled by the ever-watchful Benefactor. However,...

Gentleman thief Arsène Lupin finds himself wrongfully accused of murder, and must find the real killer to clear his name. This early work by Maurice Leblanc was originally published in 1910 and we are now republishing it with a brand new introductory biography. Maurice Marie Émile Leblanc was born on 11th November 1864 in Rouen, Normandy, France. He was a novelist and writer of short stories, known primarily as the creator of the fictional gentleman...

"Her life was a bridge from the nineteenth century to the twentieth, from the time-hallowed beauty and rigidity of a samurai household to the disorienting, forward-looking freedoms of the West." --Janice P. Nimura, from the foreword. This is the story of one woman's remarkable life successfully navigating two very different cultures--the first memoir of an Asian-American woman. Beautifully told, this immigrant's account of an unforgettable journey...