In Paris, terror stalks the Opera Garnier. Stories of a terrifying ghost haunting the theatre create panic amongst the musicians and audience. But the ghost is no supernatural phenomenon, but a living, deformed man, Erik, who is hopelessly in love with a promising singer: the beautiful Christine Daae. When her childhood friend Raoul begins courting her, Erik erupts in jealousy and soon the phantom becomes violent and reckless.

Homer’s Odyssey is the ancient Greek tale of Odysseus and his eventful voyage home after the Trojan War,The hero and his crew escape a man-eating Cyclops and, having angered the sea-god Poseidon, are then beset by storms and blown to an island where a witch transforms the sailors into pigs.With his fleet destroyed, Odysseus is held captive for seven years’by the nymph Calypso, who offers him immortality if he will stay with her. But the desire to return to his loving wife, Penelope, is too strong and Odysseus determines to reach his home at Ithaca. His many adventures are the subject . of this famous prose translation by Т.Е. Lawrence, У which was the first to be aimed at a general readership.

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 guide, Magua, turns out to be a traitorous French sympathizer who holds the sisters captive until Hawkeye and the Mohicans come to their rescue. Even then, their troubles are far from over.

Returning home from the University of St. Petersburg, Arkady Kirsanov discovers that, while he has changed, the world he left behind has remained the same. He and his companion, the nihilistic Bazarov, find themselves at odds with their parents. Neither can accept the romantic aristocratic traditions of their families, but they struggle with the new values of liberalism and the enlightenment as each one falls in love.Set in a turbulent era of political reform and social change, Fathers and Sons is one of the true classics of Russian literature, presenting a powerful portrait of 19th-century Russian society.

After receiving a cryptic letter, Sherlock Holmes sets off to warn a wealthy American ex-pat that he is in danger, only to find John Douglas already murdered. Investigating, Holmes uncovers the dead mana€s past as a Pinkerton agent a€“ and the hand of the arch-criminal Moriarty.

A cornerstone of Western literature, Homer’s Iliad is the epic tale of the siege of Troy.After nine years, the Greeks are still fighting to reclaim the beautiful Helen and it is hardly the time for their supreme warrior, Achilles, to drop out of the war. But he does, in revenge against the overlord Agamemnon for seizing his concubine, Briseis.Only the death of his best friend, Patroclus, persuades Achilles to return to battle and confront the Trojan leader Hector in single combat.This edition features an accessible prose translation by the classical scholar and novelist Samuel Butler, first published in 1898.

A cornerstone of Western literature, Homer’s Iliad is the epic tale of the siege of Troy.After nine years, the Greeks are still fighting to reclaim the beautiful Helen and it is hardly the time for their supreme warrior, Achilles, to drop out of the war. But he does, in revenge against the overlord Agamemnon for seizing his concubine, Briseis.Only the death of his best friend, Patroclus, persuades Achilles to return to battle and confront the Trojan leader Hector in single combat.This edition features an accessible prose translation by the classical scholar and novelist Samuel Butler, first published in 1898.

Collected together here are seven of the most iconic novels of H. G. Wells, the father of science fiction himself.With each story, he presents a unique and exciting twist. In The Invisible Man, a scientist’s experimentation with visibility goes disastrously wrong. The Time Machine features a traveller recounting his adventures into the future, and The Island of Doctor Moreau explores the terrifying boundaries of human and animal morality.Other stories included are The War of the Worlds, The First Men in the Moon, When the Sleeper Wakes and The World Set Free. This array of thrilling stories ranges from scenes of alien invasions to visions of dystopian futures.

The Great Gatsby is F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel of the American Jazz Age. It is the story of a fundamentally innocent man drawn into his own destruction through infatuation with a girl called Daisy, whose voice is ‘full of money’.After his war service, Jay Gatsby accumulates a fortune from organized crime and invents a legendary new persona for himself. He buys a luxury property on Long Island, across the water from the mansion where Daisy now lives with her husband. He throws extravagant parties to attract her arrival, yet this only signals the unravelling of Gatsby’s cherished dream.

One of the most accomplished authors in history, Tolstoy has inspired and influenced generations of readers. While celebrated for his masterpieces Anna Karenina and War and Peace, his short stories are just as compelling. This collection includes ‘The Story of Ivan the Fool’, ‘Ilys’, and many more of Tolstoy’s finest tales, and it demonstrates the raw power and emotion of his narrative genius.

The Great Gatsby (1925) is F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel of the Jazz Age and one of the greatest works of the twentieth century. It is the story of a charismatic figure drawn to his own destruction through infatuation with a girl called Daisy, whose voice is ‘full of money’.Having mysteriously accumulated a fortune after World War I, the charming Gatsby pursues the American Dream of wealth and influence to its glittering limits only to discover the emptiness that lies at its core.’An American masterpiece in its final form: the original crystal has shaped itself into the true diamond.’James Dickey, poet and novelist

Alexei Ivanovich is tutor to a Russian family in a German spa town. They are bankrupt and eagerly awaiting the death of their wealthy matriarch, ‘Grandmother’. Alexei falls in love twice: first, with the beautiful but impossible Polina, who goads him into placing bets for her at the local casino; and second, with the game of roulette itself. His addiction turns out to be shared by Grandmother who suddenly appears, very much alive, and willing to gamble down to her last banknote.Under pressure from his publisher, Dostoyevsky — a gambling addict himself — wrote The Gambler (1867) in less than one month.

«If you look at the way critics describe Lovecraft… they often say he’s purple, overwritten, overblown, verbose, butit’s un-put-downable. There’s something about that kind of hallucinatorily intense purple prose which completely breaches all rules of’good writing’, but is somehow utterly compulsive and affecting.»- China Mieville, Science Fiction StudiesSince his stories began to appear in magazines such as Weird Tales in the 1920s and 30s, H. P. Lovecraft and his vividimagination have been entertaining generations of readers with tales that both drew upon and pushed the boundaries ofthe genres of horror and science fiction.Lovecraft’s influence has been immense: countless writers — from Stephen King to Neil Gaiman — and filmmakers suchas Guillermo del Того have acknowledged the way in which Lovecraft has inspired them.Filled with suspense, amazing creatures and sensationally scary scenarios, this chronologically ordered collection ofhis short stories and novellas demonstrates the power of Lovecraft’s ability to thrill and entertain.

Regarded by many as a masterpiece. The Call of Cthulhu is among H. P. Lovecraft’s most famous works. Recounting the mystery of the cult of Cthulhu, it conjures up a darkand fascinating world.The Cthulhu Mythos has since become a study of its own for those who have delighted in Lovecraft’s writing, captivated by the weird horror and dark fantasy of which he was a master. In addition to The Call of Cthulhu, this collection of stories alsoincludes others that made either direct or indirect reference to Cthulhu: Dagon, The Dunwich Horror, The Whisperer in Darkness and The Haunter of the Dark.

Revolution is in the air at Manor Farm after old Major, a prize boar, tells the other animals about his dream of freedom and teaches them to sing ‘Beasts of England’. Mr. Jones, the drunken farmer, is deposed and a committee of pigs takes over the running of the farm. The animals are taught to read and write, but the dream turns sour, the purges begin and those in charge come more and more to resembletheir oppressors.Orwell’s allegory of the Soviet revolution remains as lucid and compelling as ever. In beautifully clearprose, he gives us a vivid gallery of characters and a fable that conveys the truth about how we aremanipulated through language and the impossibility of finding heaven on earth.

Arguably the 20th-century’s most famous novel, 1984 is a dystopian study of political tyranny, mind control, paranoia and secret mass surveillance. Set in Oceania, the ultimate totalitarian state, it describes a society tyrannized by a ruling party ledby Big Brother. In the furtherance of eradicating all expressions of individuality, people’s lives are constantly monitored. Telescreens are everywhere, helicopters hover around buildings, spying through windows, and the Thought Police are constantly on alert.Despite the threat of severe punishment, Outer Party Member Winston Smith takes a break from his job rewriting history. At home, in the one corner of his apartment that is hidden from the telescreen, he sits down to write a diary.The cultural impact of George Orwell’s masterpiece continues to resonate to this day.

Arthur Conan Doyle was born on 22 May 1859 in Edinburgh. He received his early education from Jesuits, but as an adolescent rejected Christianity, proclaimed himself an agnostic and later embraced Spiritualism. Attracted to both literature and medicine, Conan Doyle sold his first story to Chambers’s Edinburgh Journal whilst studying to become a doctor at the University of Edinburgh. He completed his studies and established an unsuccessful ophthalmology practice in Plymouth. With few patients, Conan Doyle supplemented a rather meagre income through writing. His first major success came at the end of 1887, with the publication of A Study in Scarlet in Beeton’s Christmas Annual. Published in book form the following summer, the short novel featured the first appearance of Sherlock Holmes. More works featuring the great detective soon followed, including the novel The Sign of Four (1890) and the twelve stories that, together, comprise The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1892). By 1893, Conan Doyle had tired of Holmes and, intending to concentrate on historical novels, killed off the character in a story entitled ‘The Final Problem’. However, in 1902 Conan Doyle bowed to public pressure and published a new Holmes novel, The Hound of the Baskervilles. That same year he received a knighthood — in recognition not of his great literary creation, but for his work as a propagandist during the Boer War.Several more Sherlock Holmes books followed, the last being a collection of stories called The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes (1927).

The book has no illustrations or index. Purchasers are entitled to a free trial membership in the General Books Club where they can select from more than a million books without charge.

«All American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn. There was nothing before. There has been nothing as good since.» Ernest HemingwayTo escape from his violent, drunken father, Huckleberry Finn, a thirteen-year-old boy from the wrong side of the tracks, fakes his own death and floats away on a raft down the Mississippi River with Jim, a runaway slave. In a series of unforgettable adventures narrated by Huck, they encounter a cross-section of characters from slave-hunters, thieves and conmen to feuding aristocrats.The first major American novel to be written in the vernacular, this dark, funny satire exposes the bigotry and hypocrisy of provincial America during Twain’s lifetime.

This stylish jacketed hardback presents one of the greatest works of modern literature, The Great Gatsby, featuring a contemporary cover design and beautiful endpapers.Jay Gatsby is a mystery to Nick. On the surface he is a man of wealth and excess — throwing wild, extravagant parties that run deep into the night. But cracks begin to show in this facade as we meet Daisy Buchanan, the lady across the lake who is the object of his quiet obsession.A paragon of the Great American Novel, The Great Gatsby is a tragic love story which captures the hollow decadence of the Jazz Age. As events unfold, both Gatsby and narrator Nick are forced to confront the rot beneath the shiny surface of high society and the unreality of the American dream.This collector’s edition would make a wonderful gift for any literature lover.

Thomas Hardy’s beautiful and spirited heroine is driven to her tragic end by three men who betray her trust: John Durbeyfield, her drunken, feckless father; the seducer Alec d’Urberville, who leaves Tess pregnant at 16 with a son that dies in infancy; and Angel Clare, the unforgiving husband who rejects her.Abandoned in so many ways, Tess suffers all the hypocrisy and injustice of Victorian morality that Hardy himself despised.When Angel returns from abroad, humbled and hoping for reconciliation, Tess makes a fateful bid to be reunited with the one person she has never ceased to love.

‘But soft, what light through yonder window breaks? It is the East, and Juliet is the sun.’Written between 1591 and 1595, Romeo & Juliet is one of Shakespeare’s greatest and most popular plays. Set in Verona, Italy, it has been performed across the world and inspired numerous other artistic works — from music to ballet and film — as well as entertaining countless generations of theatre-goers.Filled with some of Shakespeare’s most beautiful and beloved lines, this tragic tale of star-cross’d lovers will resonate with people of all ages.This edition is based on the First Folio and includes an extensive introduction that examines the origins of the work, the plot and the characters as well as notes on the text, a glossary and a timeline of Shakespeare’s life and work.

‘Is this a dagger which I see before me,The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee:I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.’Often referred to superstitiously as ‘the Scottish play’, Macbeth is one of Shakespeare’s best-loved works. As a general in the army of the Scottish king, Macbeth meets three witches who prophesy that he will one day take his master’s place.A tumultuous tale of how ambition, guilt and paranoia lead to deceit and murder, it is one of the greatest studies of morality and corruption.This edition is based on the First Folio and includes an extensive introduction that examines the origins of the work, the plot and the characters as well as notes on the text, a glossary and a timeline of Shakespeare’s life and work.