Fiction audiobooks page 221

Der Struwwelpeter, zuerst erschienen als “Lustige Geschichten und drollige Bilder mit 15 schön kolorierten Tafeln für Kinder von 3-6 Jahren”, wurde 1845 von Heinrich Hoffmann als ein Kinderbuch für seine eigene Familie geschrieben. Es wurde als eine illustrierte Sammlung von Kindergeschichten sehr bekannt durch seine erste englische Übersetzung im Jahre 1848. Das Buch wird oft als brutal angesehen, da die Kinder in den Geschichten nicht notwendigerweise gut behandelt werden. Trotzdem hatte es einen Einfluß auf spätere Literatur.

In der Nacht des 30. April, der Walpurgisnacht, stört ein schlafwandelnder Schauspieler die Abendgesellschaft im Hause des Barons Elsenwanger auf dem Hradschin in Prag. Für die nächsten 4 Wochen steht das Leben der dort versammelten Personen unter dem Zeichen der Walpurgisnacht.
Meyrinks Werke habe einen starken Zug ins Fantastische und Esoterische. "Walpurgisnacht" erinnert in seiner Dichte und Tiefgründigkeit an die Erzählungen aus "Des deutschen Spießers Wunderhorn".
(Zusammenfassung von Hokuspokus)

The title of the novella is almost an adequate summary in itself. The “boy-meets-girl-then-loses-her” story is universal but not, I think, banal – despite a surprise ending which notoriously turns out to be very little of a surprise. “First Love” is given its originality and poignancy by Turgenev’s mastery of the piercing turning-point (akin to Joyce’s “epiphanies”) that transforms the character’s whole being, making a tragic outcome inevitable. Even the nature symbolism is rescued from triteness by lovely poetic similes – e.g. “but at that point my attention was arrested by the appearance of a speckled woodpecker who busily climbed up the slender stem of a birch-tree and peeped out un...

Ellen Gould White (1827 – 1915) was a prolific Christian writer, authoring 40 books in her lifetime. She was active in the Millerite movement, and was one of the principle founders of the Seventh Day Adventist Church.
Steps to Christ, first published in 1892, is her most popular book. It has been translated into more than 70 languages. The theme of the book is how to come to know Christ better.

A man is found shot dead and the man to whom all evidence points insists he is innocent.

Aunt Jane's Nieces on Vacation is a juvenile novel for girls, written by L. Frank Baum. It is the seventh in the ten volumes in the Aunt Jane's Nieces series, and carries forward the continuing story of the three cousins Lousie Merrick Weldon, Patsy Doyle, and Elizabeth De Graf. Like all the books in the series, it was issued under Baum's "Edith Van Dyne" pseudonym.

In this novel, Chesnutt described the hopelessness of Reconstruction in a post-Civil War South that was bent on reestablishing the former status quo and rebuilding itself as a region of the United States where new forms of "slavery" would replace the old. This novel illustrated how race hatred and the impotence of a reluctant Federal Government trumped the rule of law, ultimately setting the stage for the rise of institutions such as Jim Crow, lynching, chain gangs and work farms--all established with the intent of disenfranchising African Americans.

“Love!–A word by superstition thought a God; by use turned to an humour; by self-will made a flattering madness.” – Alexander and Campaspe.

Lady Juliana, the indulged and coddled seventeen (”And a half, papa”) year old daughter of the Earl of Cortland, is betrothed by her father to a wealthy old Duke who can give her every luxury. She instead runs away and marries her very handsome but penniless lover. Very soon, they are forced to travel to Scotland to live with his quirky family in a rundown “castle” in the barren wilderness. Can this marriage survive?(Summary by P.Cunningham)

The Spanish Tragedy, or Hieronimo is Mad Again is an Elizabethan tragedy written by Thomas Kyd between 1582 and 1592. Highly popular and influential in its time, The Spanish Tragedy established a new genre in English theatre, the revenge play or revenge tragedy. Its plot contains several violent murders and includes as one of its characters a personification of Revenge. The Spanish Tragedy was often referred to (or parodied) in works written by other Elizabethan playwrights, including William Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, and Christopher Marlowe.
Many elements of The Spanish Tragedy, such as the play-within-a-play used to trap a murderer and a ghost intent on vengeance, appear in Shakespear...

While riding a stage back to the city late in the summer, a youngster had no money to spend, and so gives his lucky piece as payment to a young girl selling berries by the roadside. As time passes, in the Adirondack mountains of northern New York state, a tale unfolds involving two young women, two young men, and a bevy of characters the likes of which lend to a series of events which make up a fascinating story. Constance was one not to be controlled, she was a free spirit, as in fairy tales, wont to follow the moment rather than ideas presented to her by others. Frank came from a well to do family who expected nothing but success from their offspring. Robin appeared of suspicious origin...