153 books tagged "Victorian/Regency"
"Two distinguished guests are travelling separately towards a ceremony where they will meet for the first time for three decades. Both are apprehensive as they review the successes and failures of their public life, and their secret history." "Humphrey and Ailsa met as children, by the grey northern sea to which they are returning. Humphrey was already a serious child, drawn towards the underwater world of marine biology, but there were as yet few signs of Ailsa's dazzling transformation into a flamboyant feminist celebrity. The novel traces the evolution of their careers and their passionately entangled relationship, and brings them together again to see what they will make of their past, and in what spirit they will be able to face the future." "In this elegiac novel, Margaret Drabble examines the ways in which place, chance and time merge to make us what we are."--BOOK JACKET
"From the New York Times bestselling author of Me Before You and One Plus One, in an earlier work available in the U.S. for the first time, a post-WWII story of the war brides who crossed the seas by the thousands to face their unknown futures. 1946. World War II has ended and all over the world, young women are beginning to fulfill the promises made to the men they wed in wartime. In Sydney, Australia, four women join 650 other war brides on an extraordinary voyage to England-aboard HMS Victoria, which still carries not just arms and aircraft but a thousand naval officers. Rules are strictly enforced, from the aircraft carrier's captain down to the lowliest young deckhand. But the men and the brides will find their lives intertwined despite the Navy's ironclad sanctions. And for Frances Mackenzie, the complicated young woman whose past comes back to haunt her far from home, the journey will change her life in ways she never could have predicted - forever"--
A hired tutor for four orphaned girls at a remote Castle, Concordia Glade is pleased to find her pupils both eager & smart they are bright enough to notice some odd things about their situation. Provided for by an unseen benefactor, they are surrounded at all times by hard-eyed guards in the guise of gardeners—and their previous tutor, she learns, disappeared under mysterious circumstances. They get help from Concordia and Ambrose, a man who comes they're rescue.
Book #4 Vanza Series
Series as Follows:
Book 1- With this Ring
Book 2- I Thee Wed
Book 3- Wicked Widow
Book 4- Lie by Moonlight
"As the Inghams' and the Swanns' journey from a family weekend in the summer of 1926 through to the devastation of the Wall Street crash of 1929, the Cavendon women band together and bring their family into a new decade and a new way of life"--
In the 1960s, off the coast of East Anglia, a disgruntled boarding school student develops an obsessive friendship with a boy living by himself at the edge of the sea.
Kraken is a fantasy novel by British author China Miéville. It is published in the UK by Macmillan, and in the US by Del Rey Books. The book bears the subtitle "An Anatomy" on the title page. It was the winner for the 2011 Locus Award for Best Fantasy Novel.
Miéville has described the book as "a dark comedy about a squid-worshipping cult and the end of the world. It takes the idea of the squid cult very seriously. Part of the appeal of the fantastic is taking ridiculous ideas very seriously and pretending they’re not absurd."
Following the death of his wife, Max Morden retreats to the seaside town of his childhood summers, where his own life becomes inextricably entwined with the members of the vacationing Grace family.
Discovering the body of a woman in the sauna room of her local gym, Inspector Vera Stanhope, hoping that she has uncovered a simple natural-causes death, subsequently finds strangle bruises that reveal that the victim was murdered.
Investigator Vera Stanhope searches for a young man's killer and uncovers a small town's secrets.
Award-winning author Alan Bradley returns with another beguiling novel starring the insidiously clever and unflappable eleven-year-old sleuth Flavia de Luce. The precocious chemist with a passion for poisons uncovers a fresh slew of misdeeds in the hamlet of Bishop's Lacey--mysteries involving a missing tot, a fortune-teller, and a corpse in Flavia's own backyard.
Flavia had asked the old Gypsy woman to tell her fortune, but never expected to stumble across the poor soul, bludgeoned in the wee hours in her own caravan. Was this an act of retribution by those convinced that the soothsayer had abducted a local child years ago? Certainly Flavia understands the bliss of settling scores; revenge is a delightful pastime when one has two odious older sisters. But how could this crime be connected to the missing baby? Had it something to do with the weird sect who met at the river to practice their secret rites? While still pondering the possibilities, Flavia stumbles upon another corpse--that of a notorious layabout who had been caught prowling about the de Luce's drawing room.
Pedaling Gladys, her faithful bicycle, across the countryside in search of clues to both crimes, Flavia uncovers some odd new twists. Most intriguing is her introduction to an elegant artist with a very special object in her possession--a portrait that sheds light on the biggest mystery of all: Who is Flavia?
As the red herrings pile up, Flavia must sort through clues fishy and foul to untangle dark deeds and dangerous secrets.
An Anglican bishop's daughter gets in over her head with British Intelligence in this John le Carre-esque caper from the author of *Atonement*. Brash, bookish Serena just might make a perfect spy-if she can keep her heart under wraps.
As Daniel X continues to hunt for intergalactic aliens, he and his friends go to England searching for Beta, an outlaw who takes the form of fire and who killed Daniel's parents when he was two years old.
<p>By the mid-nineteenth century, the transition of textile production in England from a cottage craft to mechanized factories was complete. Still, the effects of the industrial revolution remain distant from the idyllic rural parish in the New Forest where Margaret Hale grows up. But with her father’s crisis of conscience in ministry, the country lanes of Hampshire give way to the crowded urban streets of the industrial North of England. Mr. Hale’s new role as a private tutor brings Margaret into contact not only with her father’s favorite student—one of the “masters” of a factory—but also leads to her meeting, and caring for, the poor families of factory workers.</p> <p>Margaret finds her sympathies torn as she grows to understand the differing outlooks and interests of “masters and men,” especially as an industrial dispute brings the lives of both classes into crisis. But there is much more to Margaret’s life than politics and economics. An accomplished and beautiful young woman, she finds her abilities stretched by personal family tragedies, and her affections tested by differing claims on her life, both from intimate family members, and from suitors smitten by her unstudied charms.</p> <p><i>North and South</i> would have been titled <i>Margaret Hale</i>, if <a href="https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/elizabeth-gaskell">Elizabeth Gaskell</a> had had her way. She was overruled by <a href="https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/charles-dickens">Charles Dickens</a> in whose magazine Gaskell’s novel was first serialized, and who insisted on the present title. Dynamics between the leading characters have often reminded readers of <a href="https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/jane-austen">Jane Austen’s</a> <a href="https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/jane-austen/pride-and-prejudice"><i>Pride and Prejudice</i></a>, although in the case of Gaskell’s protagonists, these qualities are more evenly distributed.</p> <p>Contemporary critics were less than enthusiastic about the “women’s perspective” in the book, but appreciation has grown steadily and significantly for Gaskell’s writing and insights in <i>North and South</i>. Her sensitive handling of Mr. Hale’s religious scruples, her unsentimental portrayal of the urban working poor, and her prescient depiction of shifting social and gender roles all find a contemporary appeal. Although once neglected among Gaskell’s works, successive adaptations for television—the latest in 2004—have won for the book a higher profile and wider readership.</p>
Tom Forsyth returns to his childhood home after being badly wounded in Afghanistan. Never having seen eye to eye with his racehorse trainer mother, Tom doesn't expect a hero's welcome, but even he's not prepared for the reception that awaits him.
A new Chief Inspector Wexford mystery from the author who Time magazine has called "the best mystery writer in the English-speaking world." When the truffle-hunting dog starts to dig furiously, his master's first reaction is delight at the size of the clump the dog has unearthed: at the going rate, this one truffle might be worth several hundred pounds. Then the dirt falls away to reveal not a precious mushroom but the bones and tendons of what is clearly a human hand.In Not in the Flesh, Chief Inspector Wexford tries to piece together events that took place eleven years earlier, a time when someone was secretly interred in a secluded patch of English countryside. Now Wexford and his team will need to interrogate everyone who lives nearby to see if they can turn up a match for the dead man among the eighty-five people in this part of England who have disappeared over the past decade. Then, when a second body is discovered nearby, Wexford experiences a feeling that's become a rarity for the veteran policeman: surprise.As Wexford painstakingly moves to resolve these multiple mysteries, long-buried secrets are brought to daylight, and Ruth Rendell once again proves why she has been hailed as our greatest living mystery writer.From the Hardcover edition.
Dark men and darker deeds from the New York Times- bestselling author and "dean of intrigue novelists" (St. Louis Post- Dispatch) On Long Island, a trusted operative for the president nudges his boat up to a pier, when a man materializes out of the rain and shoots him. In London, General Charles Ferguson, adviser to the prime minister, approaches his car on a side street, when there is a flash and the car explodes. In New York, a former British soldier, who is also a bit more than that, takes a short walk in Central Park to stretch his legs, when a man comes up fast behind him, a pistol in his hand.And that is only the beginning. Someone is targeting the members of the elite intelligence unit known as "the Prime Minister's private army" and all those who work with them, and whoever is doing it has a lot of resources at his command. Sean Dillon has an idea of who it may be, an old nemesis who has clearly gotten tired of their interference in his schemes. But proving it is going to be a difficult task. And surviving it the hardest task of all. . .
"This Was a Man opens with a shot being fired, but who pulled the trigger, and who lives and who dies? In Whitehall, Giles Barrington discovers the truth about his wife Karin from the Cabinet Secretary. Is she a spy or a pawn in a larger game? Harry Clifton sets out to write his magnum opus, while his wife Emma completes her ten years as Chairman of the Bristol Royal Infirmary, and receives an unexpected call from Margaret Thatcher offering her a job. Sebastian Clifton becomes chairman of Farthings Kaufman bank, but only after Hakim Bishara has to resign for personal reasons. Sebastian and Samantha's talented daughter, Jessica, is expelled from the Slade School of Fine Art, but her aunt Grace comes to her rescue. Meanwhile, Lady Virginia is about to flee the country to avoid her creditors when the Duchess of Hertford dies, and she sees another opportunity to clear her debts and finally trump the Cliftons and Barringtons. In a devastating twist, tragedy engulfs the Clifton family when one of them receives a shocking diagnosis that will throw all their lives into turmoil. This Was a Man is the captivating final installment of the Clifton Chronicles, a series of seven novels that has topped the bestseller lists around the world, and enhanced Jeffrey Archer's reputation as a master storyteller"--
It's just another day in the life of an average kid. If you're Alex Rider, that is.A con artist has realized there is big money in charityu the bigger the disaster, the greater the money flow! So that is what he will produce: the biggest disaster known to man, all thanks to genetically modified corn that can release a virus so potent it can knock out an entire country in one windy day. But Alex Rider will face whatever it takesugunfire, explosions, hand-to-hand combat with mercenariesu to bring down his most dangerous adversary yet.Often imitated, never equaled, the series that triggered a reading phenomenon is back, exhilarating and addictive as ever.
What I want you to have, Imogen, above all, is a sense of your own history; a sense of where you come from, and of the forces that made you.'Rosamund lies dying in her remote Shropshire home. But before she does so, she has one last task: to put on tape not just her own story but the story of the young blind girl, her cousin's granddaughter, who turned up mysteriously at her party all those years ago. This is a story of generations, of the relationships within a family - and of what goes to make a child. Called "the best English novelist of his generation" by Nick Hornby, Jonathan Coe extends his range in this magnificent account of a Shropshire family in the last half of the twentieth century.
