Frederick Davidson
1) Prester John
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South Africa, 1900. After his father dies, nineteen-year-old David Crawfurd is sent off to South Africa to earn his living as a storekeeper in the back of beyond. A strange encounter on the journey suggests that dark deeds and treacherous intrigues are afoot - all bound up with the mysterious primeval kingdom of Prester John. Written as a boys' adventure story and set mostly in South Africa (where Buchan had worked).
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Honest and evocative, George Orwell's first novel is an examination of the debasing effect of empire on occupied and occupier.
Burmese Days focuses on a handful of Englishmen who meet at the European Club to drink whisky and to alleviate the acute and unspoken loneliness of life in 1920s Burma where Orwell himself served as an imperial policeman during the waning days of British imperialism.
One of the men, James Flory, a timber merchant, has grown...
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World War I espionage thriller meets modern-day morality tale in „Mr. Standfast", the third of five Richard Hannay novels written by acclaimed storyteller John Buchan. In this nail-biting adventure story, Hannay must outwit a foe far more intelligent than himself; muster the courage to propose to the lovely, clever Mary Lamington; and survive a brutal war. Set, like „Greenmantle", durinig World War I, it deals Brigadier-General Hannay's recall...
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Mr. William Whittlestaff was strolling very slowly up and down the long walk at his countryseat in Hampshire, thinking of the contents of a letter, which he held crushed up within his trousers' pocket. He always breakfasted exactly at nine, and the letters were supposed to be brought to him at a quarter past. The postman was really due at his hall-door at a quarter before nine; but though he had lived in the same house for above fifteen years, and...
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"When an impoverished but charming Englishman, Archie Moffam, marries the daughter of tough American millionaire Daniel Brewster, the stage is set for a characteristic Wodehouse encounter between characters, cultures and nations. Much of the action takes place in Brewster's New York hotel where Archie eventually emerges triumphant, but only after a series of comic misadventures involving a snake, a waiter, a pie-eater, a song-writer, a tearful union...
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Featuring ten works of comedic short fiction, P.G Wodehouse's The Clicking of Cuthbert is comprised of stories about golfers that teach a lesson is an odd and amusing way. In A Woman is Only a Woman, the friendship between two men is threatened when they both fall in love with the same woman. Since she claims to like them equally, the two men decide to challenge each other to a game of golf, agreeing that the best golfer gets the woman's hand in marriage....
7) Don Juan
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First published in 1819, "Don Juan" is often acknowledged as one of Lord Byron's greatest poetic works. An epic poem, comprised of seventeen cantos that Byron continued to work on and expand until his death, "Don Juan" follows the adventures of the famous Spanish libertine and reflects upon many of the romantic and personal experiences that are universal to all mankind. From a forbidden love affair in Spain, to exile in Italy, from being shipwrecked...
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The Father Brown Mysteries volume Book 2
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Father Brown appears to be a clumsy and naive man but this unimpressive exterior hides a razor sharp mind. His great intellect and an intrinsic knowledge of humanity's capacity for evil, gained through the confessional, make him an expert at solving crimes. This gifted sleuth uses intuition over scientific method, putting himself in the shoes and minds of the criminals he seeks.
9) To let
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The final chapter in the saga of a once-wealthy English family tormented by the sins of their past. Old loves threaten to jeopardize a family's future in the final installment of the Forsyte Saga. Part social satire, part melodrama, this captivating novel brings to fascinating life author John Galsworthy's preoccupations with class, gender, and morality. Soames and Irene Forsyte have finally separated after years of turmoil. Irene is now wed to Soames's...
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"Quo Vadis is a love story of Marcus Vinicius, a passionate young Roman tribune, and Lygia Callina, a beautiful and gentle Christian maiden of royal Lygian descent and a hostage of Rome, raised in a patrician home. At first Marcus, a typical aristocratic Roman libertine of his time, has no notion of love and merely desires Lygia with erotic animalistic intensity. Through political machinations of the elegant Petronius he contrives to have her taken...
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Sally Nicholas is a pretty and popular American woman working as dance partner for hire. Orphaned, she and her brother, Fillmore, has been on their own for years. However, on Sally's twenty-first birthday, her life is changed when she learns that she and her brother have inherited a fortune, which they now have access to. Fillmore, who is overly ambitious, and impulsive intends on investing his money in schemes that promise fast wealth, in hopes to...
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Vintage book volume V-61
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In this early Forster novel, a young Englishman journeys to Tuscany to rescue his late brother's wife from what appears to be an unsuitable romance with an Italian of little fortune.
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Samuel Butler was an individualistic Victorian era writer who published a variety of works. He is also known for examining Christian orthodoxy, considerable studies of evolutionary thought, studies of Italian art, and works of literary history as well as criticism. Butler even made prose translations of "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey" which remain some of the most popular to this day. His authority on literature came through his posthumous novel, "The...
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"On a broad and colourful canvas, extending from urban and rural England to Waterloo and the continental haunts of exiles, Thackeray gives us one of the greatest social-satirical novels in the language - one of the most entertaining and profound, and, in the person of Becky Sharp, we have one of literature's most resourceful, attractive, and amoral characters. Essentially a commentary on hypocrisy and those ethical principles to which society pays...
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A decade after their wild boat ride adventure on the Thames river, J, Harris, and George reunite for another vacation. Older, richer, and fatter, but not wiser, the three men stumble through mishaps and surprises as they journey to Germany. First saying their goodbyes, J and Harris seek the approval of their wives, worried about leaving their kids. Their wives are supportive, secretly considering their husbands' trip from home as a vacation for themselves...
19) Piccadilly Jim
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The novel features Ogden Ford and his mother Nesta (both previously encountered in "The Little Nugget". Nesta has remarried, to the hen-pecked, baseball-loving millionaire Mr. Peter Pett, and Ogden remains spoilt and obnoxious. The story takes its title from the charismatic character of Jimmy Crocker, Nesta's nephew and a reforming playboy. 'Jim' is called upon to assist in the kidnapping of Ogden, amongst much confusion involving impostors, crooks,...
20) Rob Roy
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Scott's young hero Francis Osbaldistone is plunged into the intrigue and adventure of the 1715 Jacobite Rebellion when he is falsely accused of highway robbery on his journey to the North of England. In his fight for both love and justice he must outwit his villainous cousin, Rashleigh, and travel to Scotland--a land of breathtaking beauty and dark foreboding--where his salvation can only be obtained with the help of the greatest outlaw of all, Robert...