Showing results by narrator "Laurel Lefkow" in All Categories

This century unfolds with a fast-changing world riven by immense wars and glutton hungry Empires. Women strive to win the most basic of rights, the right to vote. Their literary testament is now a vital part of our cultural world. They write on all manner of subjects with truth, with imagination and with undeniable talent. We are all the richer for their words.

Once again on the American side of the Atlantic talent pours forth from the pens of these literary women. Even to choose a mere ten seems to be a choice too difficult to make. Society may hold women back but these writers are equal to the challenge and overcome its boundaries with superbly written stories that are a beacon for all others who follow.

Across fifty poems our classic poets including Christina Georgina Rossetti, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Thomas Hardy & Dante Gabriel Rossetti find verse and tender words to match the occasion. Their descriptions of nature’s ever-evolving landscape and humanity’s ever-changing lives emblazon the page with the lively ink that shapes us all.

WILL SELF is one of the most inimitable contemporary writers in the English language. In this brilliantly conceived new novel Self turns his forensic eye and technicolor imagination to the troubled life of his mother, Elaine. Standing by the mailbox outside 1100 Hemlock Street in Ithaca, New York, Elaine thinks of her husband and child inside her house and wonders: is this … it? As she begins to push back against the strictures of her life in 1950s America, she undertakes a disastrous affair that places her marriage to an Ivy League academic and former Communist Party member in peril.

The American literary tradition has, in a far shorter span of time than others throughout history, achieved a glowing and glittering reputation. From its transatlantic roots it has absorbed the sons and daughters of other cultures, other lands and made them part of her own. Within this melting pot of styles, genres and wordplay one fact stands out: In the American short story, literary tradition has a strong, vibrant and almost inclusive history, if you know where to look.

The American literary tradition has, in a far shorter span of time than others throughout history, achieved a glowing and glittering reputation. From its transatlantic roots it has absorbed the sons and daughters of other cultures, other lands and made them part of her own. Within this melting pot of styles, genres and wordplay one fact stands out: In the American short story, literary tradition has a strong, vibrant and almost inclusive history, if you know where to look.

The American literary tradition has, in a far shorter span of time than others throughout history, achieved a glowing and glittering reputation. From its transatlantic roots it has absorbed the sons and daughters of other cultures, other lands and made them part of her own. Within this melting pot of styles, genres and wordplay one fact stands out: In the American short story, literary tradition has a strong, vibrant and almost inclusive history, if you know where to look.

The American literary tradition has, in a far shorter span of time than others throughout history, achieved a glowing and glittering reputation. From its transatlantic roots it has absorbed the sons and daughters of other cultures, other lands and made them part of her own. Within this melting pot of styles, genres and wordplay one fact stands out: In the American short story, literary tradition has a strong, vibrant and almost inclusive history, if you know where to look.

Charlotte Perkins Gilman was born on the 3rd July 1860 in Hartford, Connecticut, to an unaffectionate mother and a father who abandoned her and her older brother to a life of poverty. In this volume we bring her extensive poetry writings to the fore. Her talents in the poetic arena are indisputable, bringing a brave and focused eye to a world of her words that is too often neglected.

Sherwood Anderson was born on 13th September 1876 in Camden, Ohio. That same year his first book ‘Windy McPherson’s Son’ was released and in 1919, his most famous book, ‘Winesburg, Ohio’, a collection of short stories about life in an Ohio town was released. Anderson continued to write short stories, novels and non-fiction but his only true bestseller came with ‘Dark Laughter’. His influence on writers that followed, from Faulkner to Hemingway, was immense. He also married a further two times.

Sherwood Anderson was born on 13th September 1876 in Camden, Ohio. That same year his first book ‘Windy McPherson’s Son’ was released and in 1919, his most famous book, ‘Winesburg, Ohio’, a collection of short stories about life in an Ohio town was released. Anderson continued to write short stories, novels and non-fiction but his only true bestseller came with ‘Dark Laughter’. His influence on writers that followed, from Faulkner to Hemingway, was immense. He also married a further two times.

Anna Katharine Green was born in Brooklyn, New York on November 11th, 1846. Anna’s initial ambition was to be a poet. However that path failed to ignite any significant interest and she turned to fiction writing. She published her first―and most famous work in 1878―‘The Leavenworth Case’. Wilkie Collins praised it and it sold extremely well. Anna Katharine Green died on April 11, 1935 in Buffalo, New York, at the age of 88.

Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce was born on 24th June 1842 at Horse Cave Creek in Meigs County, Ohio. His parents were poor but they introduced him to literature at an early age, instilling in him a deep appreciation of books, the written word and the elegance of language. He began his first foray as a fabulist, publishing ‘Fantastic Fables’ in 1899. But tragedy struck two years later when his second son Leigh died of pneumonia relating to his alcoholism. He continued to write short stories and poetry and also published ‘The Devil’s Dictionary’.

School teacher. Widow. Legend. Meet the courageous Mrs Annie Edson Taylor. The bravest woman you've never heard of and the first person to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel – over a decade before any male daredevil had the balls to do the same!

Mikira Rusel’s family has long been famous for breeding enchanted horses, but their prestige is no match for their rising debts. To save her ranch, Mikira has only one option: she must win the Illinir, a treacherous horserace whose riders either finish maimed or murdered. Yet each year, competitors return, tempted by its alluring prize money and unparalleled prestige. Mikira’s mission soon unites her with Arielle Kadar, an impressive yet illicit enchanter just beginning to come into her true power, and Damien Adair, a dashing young lord in the midst of a fierce succession battle.

The New York Classics Collection: Stories of the City brings together 11 of the greatest works of fiction ever written about New York City, collected into one audiobook. Featuring a sweeping history of New York City in Washington Irving's History of New York, tales of the Jazz Age in The Great Gatsby; love and deception in Edith Wharton's The Age of Innocence; alongside many more grand stories from 18th and 19th century, this collection will whisk you away into the high and low of the city that never sleeps, with some of the greatest novels ever written.

Five families. Perfect from the outside. Broken on the inside.

Throughout the long centuries of human history is the want, and the need, to share information, to exchange ideas and for that knowledge and experience, for curiosity and learning, to be the basis of a civil society. In this volume we offer up a small selection of talents from the literary landscape of American women authors whose time has now come again.

‘A dime a dozen’ as known in America, is perhaps equal to the English ‘cheap as chips’ but whatever the lingua franca of your choice in this series we hereby submit ‘A Rhyme a Dozen’ as 12 poems on many given subjects that are a well-rounded gathering, maybe even an essential guide, from the knowing pens of classic poets and their beautifully spoken verse to the comfort of your ears.

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart. They can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere. In this Century of profound change for women our Atlantic neighbours produced authors of extraordinary ability that dazzled us all with a range of ideas, characters and stories of such magnificence that literature would never be the same again. Genius is written in their names.