"Perennial Library"

The title is a quote from Chaucer. Georgia spends a year apart from Nigel, spying on a Fascist/Nazi group. The head of the group (a rich and popular person) plans to overthrow the government. George escapes capture and is rescued by Nigel's father and policeman, Sir John Strangeways.

A superb autobiography by one of the great literary figures of the twentieth century, Simone de Beauvoir's Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter offers an intimate picture of growing up in a bourgeois French family, rebelling as an adolescent against the conventional expectations of her class, and striking out on her own with an intellectual and existential ambition exceedingly rare in a young woman in the 1920s. She vividly evokes her friendships, love interests, mentors, and the early days of the most important relationship of her life, with fellow student Jean-Paul Sartre, against the backdrop of a turbulent political time.

Inspector Mallett mystery - 1 When successful London businessman Lionel Ballantine is found strangled in the smoking room of a house in the sedate Daylesford Gardens district, Scotland Yard's Inspector Mallett is called in to investigate.

The story about the dedication between a dog and a family.

Jeeves belongs to a club for butlers, and one of the rules is that every member must contribute to the club book everything about the fellow he's working for. Jeeves is so taken with his employer, Bertie Wooster, that he writes eighteen pages about him--and Bertie, quite naturally, is perturbed. Suppose the book falls into the wrong hands ...

This wry comedy of manners—Barbara Pym's seventh novel and the last one she wrote before a fifteen-year silence when she gave up writing novels altogether, a hiatus broken only in 1977—is set in the Parish of St. Basil's Church in a slightly unfashionable quarter in London. The vicar, Mark Ainger, his wife Sophia, her sister Penelope, a new arrival to the parish named Rupert Stonebird, and a gentlewoman named Ianthe Broome fret over improbable attachments and embark on a holiday to Rome that will prove decisive to them all

A Herculean undertaking: a complete history of WW II, from Versailles to Tokyo Bay; and Leckie, author of Warfare (1970) and 27 other books, pulls it off with intelligence and style. He offers little that's dramatically new in this monumental (900 pp. +) effort, but Leckie succeeds as few before him in bringing to vivid life the military, economic, social, and political woof and web of the war. For example, he opens: ""At eleven o'clock in the morning of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of the year 1918 the guns of the Great War began to fall silent. At dusk, a sickle moon rose. . ."" And thus he continues, limning with a novelist's close focus both the historical sweep and human-interest particulars of WW II: (""Wagner turned to Hitler and said, 'Mein Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler, are you willing to take Eva Braun as your wife?' 'I do,' Hitler replied in a sonorous voice."") A noteworthy achievement.

A collection of novellas by the distinguished Russian writer, with supplementary critical and biographical background.

Inspector Mallett mystery - 2 Every weekend, four men devoted to fly-fishing gather at a small resort hotel in rural England to enjoy their favorite sport. Though not friends, the men have learned to get along in order to share fishing rights to an especially desirable section of the River Didder. Yet beneath the surface of courtesy shown by these men, there are unexpected currents that flow inexorably to murder along the riverbank. Inspector Mallett shrewdly resolves the case with his clever use of fishing lore and practice. - from fictiondb

A fractious and intrigue-ridden set of London film people invade the sleepy English village of Steeple Tottering. While on location, a murder occurs which sets star against star, members of the film crew against each other, and the whole contingent against the local inhabitants. Action, temperament and romance flourish, on screen and off, as the story builds to a splendid denouement.

First published in 1942, this collection of essays on Maine life has been in print almost without interruption. The author began this collection as a series of pieces for Harper's Magazine when he left New York City and moved to a saltwater farm in Brooklin, Maine. His observations on town meetings, poultry, the weather, songbirds, compost, taxes, war, winter, and much more will resonate just as strongly today, to anyone attuned to Maine life, as they did half a century ago.

Fergus O'Brien, a legendary World War One flying ace with several skeletons hidden in his closet, receives a series of mocking letters predicting that he will be murdered on Boxing Day. Undaunted, O'Brien throws a Christmas party, inviting everyone who could be suspected of making the threats, along with private detective Nigel Strangeways. But despite Nigel's presence, the former pilot is found dead, just as predicted, and Nigel is left to aid the local police in their investigation while trying to ignore his growing attraction to one of the other guests — and suspects — explorer Georgina Cavendish. Thou Shell of Death is a dazzlingly complex and addictive read, laced with literary allusions, from a master of detective fiction.

From Amazon.com: Barbara Pym's last novel, and a witty portrayal of hidden emotions and passions. Leonora Eyre is an elegant woman of indeterminate age, with a fondness for Victoriana and attractive young men. Humphrey, an antique dealer, and his handsome nephew would seem to be suitable new acquaintances.

In addition to exploring the techniques of nonfiction writing, Zinsser discusses sexism in writing, jargon, and psychological writing blocks.

Who killed solo violinist Lucy Carless during a concert by the Markshire Orchestra? Was it her first husband? Or her second? Womanizer Bill Ventry? Or perhaps the clarinetist and fellow Polish émigré, Zbartorowski, with whom she'd had a violent argument? [From WorldCat]

In the stormy years before Ireland at last gained her independence a brilliant revival of Irish drama took place and culminated in the foundation of the Abbey Theatre in 1904. Of those who helped to create it - W. B. Yeats, Lady Gregory, the Fay brothers, and Miss Horniman - it was J. M. Synge as much as anyone who made the new Irish drama the force it quickly became in the theatres of the world. In his plays, as in his rich, tumbling comedy, The Playboy of the Western World, or in the tragedy of classic simplicity, Riders to the Sea, he succeeds more than any other dramatist in miraculously distilling the Irish spirit. -- from back cover.

Explains the philosophy and procedures of the newer therapeutic method that emphasizes the individual's acceptance of reality and of responsibility for his or her behavior.

A collection of works reprinted in one volume that reflects the full range of Thoreau's writing.

A challenging report on the present situation of the American Indian, and a history of his relations with the United States.

It's 1950, and Dagobert’s latest obsession is Bertran de Born, the bard of Provençal. What better reason to abandon London for the South of France? But before Jane and Dagobert can settle into the rustic Provencal village he's envisioned, they find themselves stuck in Nice, embroiled in the attempted murder of the consulate of Santa Rica, and in the tangled lives of their fellow guests at the Hotel Negresco.

Paranoid Mrs Robjohn is the least favourite client of the legal firm of Daniel Playfair & Son, what with her frequent calls, letters and visits, and her firm conviction that 'they' are out to get her. To Jane Hamish, the firm's legal secretary, struggling to write a murder mystery with the help of her lover, would-be amateur detective Dagobert, Mrs Robjohn seems the ideal murder victim. Then Jane's story begins to write itself when Mrs Robjohn is found dead at her London flat. It seems a real-life murderer is at large, and while not a few of the staff at Playfair's had good reason to dislike Mrs Robjohn, did any of them have reason enough to kill her?