Fiction Books

The wooded hills and pastures of eastern Massachusetts are so close to Boston that from upper windows of the city, looking westward, you can see the tops of pine-trees and orchard-boughs on the high horizon. There is a rustic environment on the landward side; there are old farmhouses at the back of Milton Hill and beyond Belmont which look as unchanged by the besieging suburbs of a great city as if... more...

The Great Chelsea Fire On Sunday April 12, 1908, at about 11 o’clock A. M., an alarm was rung in for a fire in the works of the Boston Blacking Co. on West 3rd St., near the Everett line. The fire department responded immediately and succeeded in putting out the fire with but very little damage, but the forty-mile gale that was blowing at the time carried sparks from the fire to nearby houses, and... more...

THE SUNDERING FLOOD Chapter I. Of a River Called the Sundering Flood, and of the Folk that Dwelt Thereby It is told that there was once a mighty river which ran south into the sea, and at the mouth thereof was a great and rich city, which had been builded and had waxed and thriven because of the great and most excellent haven which the river aforesaid made where it fell into the sea. And now it was... more...

SLOW TORTURE Straight off, we were in the country.  It was most lovely and pleasant in those sylvan solitudes in the early cool morning in the first freshness of autumn.  From hilltops we saw fair green valleys lying spread out below, with streams winding through them, and island groves of trees here and there, and huge lonely oaks scattered about and casting black blots of shade; and beyond the... more...

To begin, I am a Frenchman, a teacher of languages, and a poor man,—necessarily a poor man, as the great world would say, or I should not be a teacher of languages, and my wife a copyist of great pictures, selling her copies at small prices. In our own eyes, it is true, we are not so poor—my Clélie and I. Looking back upon our past we congratulate ourselves upon our prosperous condition. There was... more...

The patient sat stiffly in the leather chair on the other side of the desk. Nervously he pressed a coin into the palm of one hand. "Just start anywhere," I said, "and tell me all about it." "As before?" Without waiting for an answer, he continued, the coin clutched tightly in one hand. "I'm Charles J. Fisher, professor of Philosophy at Reiser College." He looked at... more...

Let me state my case calmly and without any undue fuss. I am, even by German standards, an uncommonly prudent person and I know how to keep my five senses under control. Apart from that, I am a lawyer and father to three sons. Neither during lilac time nor when there are hibiscus, sunflowers and asters on the ground am I in the habit of laying myself open to sentimental and romantic mood-swings. I do... more...

CHAPTER I THE EYES OF DREAD "What's the matter, Raal? You seem to be worried about something." Dick Oakwood, blue eyed and smiling and resembling a blond savage in his garb of soft zebra skin, glanced down at his chief warrior who prostrated himself at the feet of the boy king. "Tahara, hal! Come quickly, O Master!" replied Raal, his whole body expressing fear. "What is it,... more...

I was born March 15th 1838 at a place now called Williams in Lawrence County, Indiana. When the day came for me to be named, mother said, "He looks like my brother Zachariah," but father said, "He looks like my brother Simpson." "All right", said mother," we will just christen him Zachariah Simpson." And that is my name unto this day. Now, when mother said... more...

TWO RUNAWAYS FROM LONESOME The days of that April had been days of mist and rain. Sometimes, for hours, there would come a miracle of blue sky, white cloud, and yellow light, but always between dark and dark the rain would fall and the mist creep up the mountains and steam from the tops—only to roll together from either range, drip back into the valleys, and lift, straightway, as mist again. So that,... more...