Fiction Books

BOTH GIRLS WERE SO STUNNINGLY PRETTY, AND WORE SUCH ODD, BEWITCHING COSTUMES ON THEIR TANDEM, THAT THE PEOPLE WHO STOPPED TO WATCH THE BEAUTIES AS THEY WHIRLED BY NICKNAMED THEM "THE HEAVENLY TWINS." As Jay Gardiner drove down the village street behind his handsome pair of prancing bays, holding the ribbons skillfully over them, all the village maidens promenading up the village street or... more...

Narvon III, 2277 CE Marine Captain Jase Thompson enjoyed Evaluation Team duty, and this particular assignment appealed to what his team members called his warped sense of humor. This had started out as an odd one; it was the Archbishop of Narvon III, rather than its Baron or the System Count, who had pushed the panic button. He'd appealed to the Emperor for a battle fleet, with a full complement... more...

A WANDERER. "There's no such word."—BULWER. A wind was blowing through the city. Not a gentle and balmy zephyr, stirring the locks on gentle ladies' foreheads and rustling the curtains in elegant boudoirs, but a chill and bitter gale that rushed with a swoop through narrow alleys and forsaken courtyards, biting the cheeks of the few solitary wanderers that still lingered abroad in... more...

THE LOVE-LIGHT. Long ago, in the days when our caged blackbirds never saw a king’s soldier without whistling impudently, “Come ower the water to Charlie,” a minister of Thrums was to be married, but something happened, and he remained a bachelor. Then, when he was old, he passed in our square the lady who was to have been his wife, and her hair was white, but she, too, was still unmarried. The... more...

The Masque of the Red Death by Edgar Allan Poe The "Red Death" had long devastated the country. No pestilence had ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar and its seal—the redness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, with dissolution. The scarlet stains upon the body and especially upon the face of the... more...

CHAPTER IMISS BOLTWOOD OF BROOKLYN IS LOST IN THE MUD When the windshield was closed it became so filmed with rain that Claire fancied she was piloting a drowned car in dim spaces under the sea. When it was open, drops jabbed into her eyes and chilled her cheeks. She was excited and thoroughly miserable. She realized that these Minnesota country roads had no respect for her polite experience on Long... more...

CHAPTER I IN QUARANTINE "The pay is small enough," said Captain Kettle, staring at the blue paper. "It's a bit hard for a man of my age and experience to come down to a job like piloting, on eight pound a month and my grub." "All right, Capt'n," replied the agent. "You needn't tell me what I know already. The pay's miserable, the climate's vile, and... more...

THE TRAVELS OF TWO FROGS. FORTY miles apart, as the cranes fly, stand the great cities of Ozaka and Kioto. The one is the city of canals and bridges. Its streets are full of bustling trade, and its waterways are ever alive with gondolas, shooting hither and thither like the wooden shuttles in a loom. The other is the sacred city of the Mikado's empire, girdled with green hills and a nine-fold... more...

"If we receive this Lady Mary Montgomery, we shall also have to receive her dreadful husband." "He is said to be quite charming." "He is a Representative!" "Of course they are all wild animals to you, but one or two have been pointed out to me that looked quite like ordinary gentlemen—really." "Possibly. But no person in official life has ever entered my house. I... more...

The translation of Goethe's "Prose Maxims" now offered to the public is the first attempt that has yet been made to present the greater part of these incomparable sayings in English. In the complete collection they are over a thousand in number, and not more perhaps than a hundred and fifty have already found their way into our language, whether as contributions to magazines here and in... more...