A chance acquaintance brings together the prosperous bourgeois Wilcox family and the clever, cultured, and idealistic Schlegel sisters. As clear-eyed Margaret develops a friendship with Mrs. Wilcox, the impetuous Helen brings into their midst a young bank clerk named Leonard Bast, who lives at the edge of poverty and ruin. When Mrs. Wilcox dies, her family discovers that she wants to leave her country home, Howards End, to Margaret. Thus as Forster...

"When headstrong and beautiful housemaid Sally Jupp is found strangled in her bed behind a bolted door, Detective Chief-Inspector Adam Dalgliesh of Scotland Yard must unmask her killer from a houseful of suspects--most of whom had very good reason to wish her ill."--Page 4 of cover.

The first novel Patrick O'Brian ever wrote about the sea, a precursor to the acclaimed Aubrey/Maturin series.In the year 1740, Commodore (later Admiral) George Anson embarked on a voyage that would become one of the most famous exploits in British naval history. Sailing through poorly charted waters, Anson and his men encountered disaster, disease, and astonishing success. They circumnavigated the globe and seized a nearly incalculable sum of Spanish...

Hardy's last novel deals with a peasant scholar's foiled ambition, in a somber and painful work which was sharply criticized when it was first published. He dealt with sex frankly, more than was acceptable.

The marriage of two strong-minded people provides the spark for a comic confrontation between the sexes: The "shrew," Katharina, is so ill-tempered she seems unlikely to find a husband. Her father refuses to let her younger sister marry until Katherina is off his hands. Petruchio appears, marries Katharina, and "tames" her so well that he wins a bet with two other men on a test of their wives' obedience. Dr. Miller's production portrays Petruchio...