Often considered Charles Dickens??s masterpiece, Bleak House blends together several literary genres??detective fiction, romance, melodrama, and satire??to create an unforgettable portrait of the decay and corruption at the heart of English law and society in the Victorian era. Opening in the swirling mists of London, the novel revolves around a court case that has dragged […]
A terrifying psychological trip into the life of one Joseph K., an ordinary man who wakes up one day to find himself accused of a crime he did not commit, a crime whose nature is never revealed to him. Once arrested, he is released, but must report to court on a regular basis–an event that […]
Following the success of “Pickwick Papers” and “Oliver Twist”, “Nicholas Nickleby” was hailed as a comic triumph and firmly established Dickens as a literary gentleman. It has a full supporting cast of delectable characters that range from the iniquitous Wackford Squeers and his family, to the delightful Mrs Nickleby, taking in the eccentric Crummles and […]
Surprisingly, this long essay about society and art and sexism is one of Woolfs most accessible works. Woolf, a major modernist writer and critic, takes us on an erudite yet conversational–and completely entertaining–walk around the history of women in writing, smoothly comparing the architecture of sentences by the likes of William Shakespeare and Jane Austen, […]
A stunning and brilliantly realized future world in which individuality has been crushed is the theme of Ayn Rands bestselling masterpiece, “Anthem”. Rand presents her tale of a man who dares to make individual choices, to seek knowledge in a dark age, to love the woman of his choice. In a society in which people […]
At the heart of this vibrant saga is a vast ship, the Ibis. Its destiny is a tumultuous voyage across the Indian Ocean; its purpose, to fight China??s vicious nineteenth-century Opium Wars. As for the crew, they are a motley array of sailors and stowaways, coolies and convicts. In a time of colonial upheaval, fate […]
Things are finally looking up for defense attorney Mickey Haller. After two years of wrong turns, Haller is back in the courtroom. When Hollywood lawyer Jerry Vincent is murdered, Haller inherits his biggest case yet: the defense of Walter Elliott, a prominent studio executive accused of murdering his wife and her lover. But as Haller […]
Lone LAPD detective Harry Bosch must walk the line between criminals and crooked cops following the death of an old war buddy. Billy had been a fellow “tunnel rat”–fighting with Bosch in the nightmare underground war in Vietnam. But soon Billys murder is linked to a bank robbery via complex tunnels beneath the bank. HC: […]
The Dollmaker, a serial killer terrorizing L.A., left a calling card on the faces of his female victims. With one shot, Det. Harry Bosch thought he had ended the citys nighmare. He was wrong. A new victim is discovered with the Dollmakers macabre signature. For the second time, Harry must hunt down a killer who […]
Harry Boschs life is a mess. His new house has been condemned because of earthquake damage. His girlfriend has left him. Hes drinking too much. And hes even had to turn in his badge: he attacked his commanding officer and is suspended indefinitely pending a psychiatric evaluation. At first Bosch resists the LAPD shrink, but […]
LAPD Homicide detective Bosch is back from an involuntary administrative leave just in time for the bodies to start turning up. When he finds hints of an mob hit but cant interest the organized crime unit in the murder, Bosch has to take the investigation into his own hands in a this hard-boiled tale full […]
“On New Years Day, Detective Harry Bosch fields a call that a dog has found a bone – a bone that the dogs owner, a doctor, feels certain is a human bone.” “Bosch investigates, and that chance discovery leads him to a shallow grave in the Hollywood hills, evidence of a murder committed more than […]
“Only the money was real. Four years ago, LAPD detective Harry Bosch was on a movie set asking questions about the murder of a young production assistant when an armored car arrived with two million dollars cash for use in a heist scene. In a life-imitates-art firestorm, a gang of masked men converged on the […]
“FBI agent Rachel Walling finally gets the call shes dreaded for years: the one that tells her the Poet has returned. Years ago she worked on the famous case, tracking down the serial killer who wove lines of poetry into his hideous crimes. Rachel has never forgotten Robert Backus, the killer who called himself the […]
“In Los Angeles in 1988, a sixteen-year-old girl disappeared from her home and was later found dead of a gunshot wound to the chest. The death appeared at first to be a suicide – but some of the evidence contradicted that scenario, and detectives came to believe this was in fact a murder. Despite a […]