Wes Rockville, a disgraced law-enforcement agent, gets one last chance to prove himself and save his career when he’s reassigned to a 232-year-old secret government organization. The Witches Protection Program. His first assignment: uncover a billion-dollar cosmetics company’s diabolical plan to use witchcraft for global domination, while protecting its heiress Morgan Pendragon from her aunt’s evil deeds. Reluctantly paired with veteran witch protector, Alastair Verne, Wes must learn to believe in witches…and believe in himself. Filled with adventure and suspense, Michael Okon creates a rousing, tongue-in-cheek alternate reality where witches cast spells and wreak havoc in modern-day New York City.

Cal, Letty, Tony, Opi, and Sasha were thrust together when they were kidnapped by the Molethian civilization and forced to become a fighter crew to battle against The Horde, the most vicious, predatory enemy in all the Milky Way galaxy. At first, only Letty could get along with the rest of them, and they basically hated each other. However, due largely to Letty’s efforts, they became not only the top fighting crew in the Shadow Warriors, but also a close family that love and support each other. Due to Opi’s amazing strategic thinking, Letty’s organizational skills, Sasha’s unparalleled ability as a weapons officer, Tony’s crack talent as a navigator, and Cal’s icy nerve as a battle leader, they have found a way to defeat two major Horde invasions. Opi, already becoming the chief strategist for an entire wing of the Molethian space forces, decides that an entirely new way of fighting Horde forces must be put in place. Her audacious plan is to search a central volume of the Milky Way through which the Horde always travels, discover the military bases they have no doubt established, and destroy them all. She is convinced that a huge base has been built by The Horde on the opposite side of the galaxy, very near The Horde’s own small galactic home, the Dwarf Spheroidal Sagittarius Galaxy. In the meantime, a third Horde invasion of about 40,000 ships nears Molethan’s home planet. Using Opi’s old strategies, Molethian forces manage to destroy it, but the new, highly capable Horde fighters make this victory far more difficult. In addition, Tony is reported missing and presumed lost. Grieving over Tony, whom she loved, Opi refuses to succumb to her grief, immediately commissioning the search for the other Horde home bases in the Milky Way. A search party finds the monstrous Horde base almost 70,000 lightyears across the galaxy. Molethan appeals to the other Alliance systems, and a major attack on the base is started, with Cal the attack leader. Things seem to be going well when suddenly, in the midst of the battle, a new enemy strikes, heavily damaging not only Shadow Warriors fighters but also many of the Alliance carriers. The fate of the battle hangs on a razor’s edge. Can the Alliance, led by Cal, Opi, and the rest of their team, manage to win over two opponents, or are they destined to be destroyed by the combined forces of two enemies?

Gamearth: It was supposed to be just another Sunday night fantasy role-playing game for David, Tyrone, Scott, and Melanie. But after years of playing, the game had become so real that all their creations—humans, sorcerers, dragons, ogres, panther-folk, Cyclops—now had existences of their own. And when the four outside players decide to end their game, the characters inside the world of Gamearth—warriors, scholars, and the few remaining wielders of magic—band together to keep their land from vanishing. Now they must embark on a desperate quest for their own magic—magic that can twist the Rules enough to save them all from the evil that the players created to destroy their entire world.

Mr. Hungerton, her father, really was the most tactless person upon earth,—a fluffy, feathery, untidy cockatoo of a man, perfectly good-natured, but absolutely centered upon his own silly self. If anything could have driven me from Gladys, it would have been the thought of such a father-in-law. I am convinced that he really believed in his heart that I came round to the Chestnuts three days a week for the pleasure of his company, and very especially to hear his views upon bimetallism, a subject upon which he was by way of being an authority. For an hour or more that evening I listened to his monotonous chirrup about bad money driving out good, the token value of silver, the depreciation of the rupee, and the true standards of exchange. "Suppose," he cried with feeble violence, "that all the debts in the world were called up simultaneously, and immediate payment insisted upon,—what under our present conditions would happen then?" I gave the self-evident answer that I should be a ruined man, upon which he jumped from his chair, reproved me for my habitual levity, which made it impossible for him to discuss any reasonable subject in my presence, and bounced off out of the room to dress for a Masonic meeting. At last I was alone with Gladys, and the moment of Fate had come! All that evening I had felt like the soldier who awaits the signal which will send him on a forlorn hope; hope of victory and fear of repulse alternating in his mind. She sat with that proud, delicate profile of hers outlined against the red curtain. How beautiful she was! And yet how aloof! We had been friends, quite good friends; but never could I get beyond the same comradeship which I might have established with one of my fellow-reporters upon the Gazette,—perfectly frank, perfectly kindly, and perfectly unsexual. My instincts are all against a woman being too frank and at her ease with me. It is no compliment to a man. Where the real sex feeling begins, timidity and distrust are its companions, heritage from old wicked days when love and violence went often hand in hand. The bent head, the averted eye, the faltering voice, the wincing figure—these, and not the unshrinking gaze and frank reply, are the true signals of passion. Even in my short life I had learned as much as that—or had inherited it in that race memory which we call instinct. Gladys was full of every womanly quality. Some judged her to be cold and hard; but such a thought was treason. That delicately bronzed skin, almost oriental in its coloring, that raven hair, the large liquid eyes, the full but exquisite lips,—all the stigmata of passion were there. But I was sadly conscious that up to now I had never found the secret of drawing it forth. However, come what might, I should have done with suspense and bring matters to a head to-night. She could but refuse me, and better be a repulsed lover than an accepted brother. So far my thoughts had carried me, and I was about to break the long and uneasy silence, when two critical, dark eyes looked round at me, and the proud head was shaken in smiling reproof. "I have a presentiment that you are going to propose, Ned. I do wish you wouldn't; for things are so much nicer as they are." I drew my chair a little nearer. "Now, how did you know that I was going to propose?" I asked in genuine wonder."Don't women always know? Do you suppose any woman in the world was ever taken unawares? But—oh, Ned, our friendship has been so good and so pleasant! What a pity to spoil it! Don't you feel how splendid it is that a young man and a young woman should be able to talk face to face as we have talked?" "I don't know, Gladys. You see, I can talk face to face with—with the station-master." I can't imagine how that official came into the matter; but in he trotted, and set us both laughing. "That does not satisfy me in the least. I want my arms round you, and your head on my breast, and—oh, Gladys, I want——"

The third novel, The Vicomte de Bragelonne (serialized October, 1847—January, 1850), has enjoyed a strange history in its English translation. It has been split into three, four, or five volumes at various points in its history. The five-volume edition generally does not give titles to the smaller portions, but the others do. In the three-volume edition, the novels are entitled The Vicomte de Bragelonne, Louise de la Valliere, and The Man in the Iron Mask. For the purposes of this etext, I have chosen to split the novel as the four-volume edition does, with these titles: The Vicomte de Bragelonne, Ten Years Later, Louise de la Valliere, and The Man in the Iron Mask. In the first three etexts: The Vicomte de Bragelonne (Etext 2609): It is the year 1660, and D'Artagnan, after thirty-five years of loyal service, has become disgusted with serving King Louis XIV while the real power resides with the Cardinal Mazarin, and has tendered his resignation. He embarks on his own project, that of restoring Charles II to the throne of England, and, with the help of Athos, succeeds, earning himself quite a fortune in the process. D'Artagnan returns to Paris to live the life of a rich citizen, and Athos, after negotiating the marriage of Philip, the king's brother, to Princess Henrietta of England, likewise retires to his own estate, La Fere. Meanwhile, Mazarin has finally died, and left Louis to assume the reigns of power, with the assistance of M. Colbert, formerly Mazarin's trusted clerk. Colbert has an intense hatred for M. Fouquet, the king's superintendent of finances, and has resolved to use any means necessary to bring about his fall. With the new rank of intendant bestowed on him by Louis, Colbert succeeds in having two of Fouquet's loyal friends tried and executed. He then brings to the king's attention that Fouquet is fortifying the island of Belle-Ile-en-Mer, and could possibly be planning to use it as a base for some military operation against the king. Louis calls D'Artagnan out of retirement and sends him to investigate the island, promising him a tremendous salary and his long-promised promotion to captain of the musketeers upon his return. At Belle-Isle, D'Artagnan discovers that the engineer of the fortifications is, in fact, Porthos, now the Baron du Vallon, and that's not all. The blueprints for the island, although in Porthos's handwriting, show evidence of another script that has been erased, that of Aramis. D'Artagnan later discovers that Aramis has become the bishop of Vannes, which is, coincidentally, a parish belonging to M. Fouquet. Suspecting that D'Artagnan has arrived on the king's behalf to investigate, Aramis tricks D'Artagnan into wandering around Vannes in search of Porthos, and sends Porthos on an heroic ride back to Paris to warn Fouquet of the danger. Fouquet rushes to the king, and gives him Belle-Isle as a present, thus allaying any suspicion, and at the same time humiliating Colbert, just minutes before the usher announces someone else seeking an audience with the king. Ten Years Later (Etext 2681): As 1661 approaches, Princess Henrietta of England arrives for her marriage, and throws the court of France into complete disorder. The jealousy of the Duke of Buckingham, who is in love with her, nearly occasions a war on the streets of Le Havre, thankfully prevented by Raoul's timely and tactful intervention. After the marriage, though, Monsieur Philip becomes horribly jealous of Buckingham, and has him exiled. Before leaving, however, the duke fights a duel with M. de Wardes at Calais. De Wardes is a malicious and spiteful man, the sworn enemy of D'Artagnan, and, by the same token, that of Athos, Aramis, Porthos, and Raoul as well. Both men are seriously wounded, and the duke is taken back to England to recover. Raoul's friend, the Comte de Guiche, is the next to succumb to Henrietta's charms, and Monsieur obtains his exile as well, though De Guiche soon effects a reconciliation.

Кра?на стр?мко летить у пр?рву: моторошна криза охоплю? вс? царини людського життя. Псевдовчен? наполегливо пропагують: мислення – це ?люз?я, пошук будь-якого сенсу – абсурд, ? зрештою уряд оголошу? моратор?й на розум. Талано- вит? п?дпри?мц? безсл?дно зникають, кидаючи сво? виробництво напризволяще або знищуючи його. Головн? геро? роману – Да?н? Та??арт ? Генк Р?арден – в?дчайдушно намагаються в?двернути катастрофу. Да?н? переконана, що в кра?н? з’явився та?м- ничий Руйн?вник, ц?ль якого – крах економ?ки ? тотальна деградац?я людей. Ж?нка не покида? над?? в?дтворити досконалий двигун, але перспективний молодий нау- ковець, який погодився допомогти ?й, в?дмовля?ться працювати на благо нев?глас?в. Да?н? не хоче в?дмовлятися в?д свого задуму, тож ?де на зустр?ч з? знев?реним до- сл?дником, а в дороз? знайомиться з волоцюгою. Свого часу в?н працював там, де й зародилося ?чисте зло?, яке зараз пожира? кра?ну… Друга частина роману м?стить блискуч? св?тоглядн? монологи, вкладен? в уста Франциско Д’Анкон?? та Генка Р?ардена.

In 1888 a client, Mary Morstan, comes with two puzzles for Holmes. The first is the disappearance of her father Captain Arthur Morstan in December 1878 and the second is that she has received 6 pearls in the mail from an anonymous benefactor once a year since 1882, since she answered an anonymous newspaper query inquiring for her. With the last pearl she has received a letter remarking that she has been a wronged woman and asks for meeting. Holmes takes the case and soon discovers that Major Sholto — Morstan's only friend who had denied seeing Morstan — had died in 1882 and that within a short span of time Mary began to receive the pearls, implying a connection. The only clue Mary can give Holmes is a map of a fortress with the names of Jonathan Small and three Sikhs, who are named Dost Akbar, Abdullah Khan, and Mahomet Singh. Holmes, Watson, and Mary meet Thaddeus Sholto, the son of the late Major Sholto and Capt Morstan's Army friend who has sent her the pearls. Thaddeus remarks that his father had a paranoid fear of one-legged men and confirms that Mary's father had seen the Major the night he died. That night, in a quarrel about an Agra Treasure, Morstan — who was in weak health — suffered a heart attack. Not wanting to bring attention to the object of the quarrel to public notice, Sholto disposed of the body and hid the treasure. However his own health became worse when he received a letter from India. Dying, he called his two sons and confessed to Morstan's death and was about to divulge the location of the treasure when he suddenly cried "Keep him out!". The puzzled sons glimpsed a face in the window but the only trace was a single footstep in the dirt. On their father's body is a note reading "The Sign of Four". Both brothers quarreled over whether a legacy should be left to Mary Morstan and Thaddeus left his brother Bartholomew, taking a chaplet and sending its pearls to Mary. The reason he sent the letter is that Bartholomew has found the treasure and possibly Thaddeus and Mary might confront him for a division of it. Bartholomew is found dead in his home from a poison dart and the treasure is missing. While the police wrongly take Thaddeus in as a suspect Holmes deduces that there are two persons involved in the murder: a one-legged man, Jonathan Small, as well as another "small" accomplice. He traces them to a boat landing where Small has hired a launch named the Aurora. With the help of his Baker Street Irregulars and his own disguise Holmes traces the launch. In a Police launch Holmes and Watson chase the Aurora and capture it but in the process end up killing the "small" companion after he attempts to kill Holmes with a poisoned dart shot from a blow-pipe. Small tries to escape but is captured. However the iron treasure box is empty; Small claims to have dumped the treasure over the side during the chase.

The book's protagonist is an English scientist and gentleman inventor living in Richmond, Surrey in Victorian England, and identified by a narrator simply as the Time Traveller. The narrator recounts the Traveller's lecture to his weekly dinner guests that time is simply a fourth dimension, and his demonstration of a tabletop model machine for travelling through it. He reveals that he has built a machine capable of carrying a person, and returns at dinner the following week to recount a remarkable tale, becoming the new narrator.In the new narrative, the Time Traveller tests his device with a journey that takes him to A.D. 802,701, where he meets the Eloi, a society of small, elegant, childlike adults. They live in small communities within large and futuristic yet slowly deteriorating buildings, doing no work and having a frugivorous diet. His efforts to communicate with them are hampered by their lack of curiosity or discipline, and he speculates that they are a peaceful communist society, the result of humanity conquering nature with technology, and subsequently evolving to adapt to an environment in which strength and intellect are no longer advantageous to survival. Returning to the site where he arrived, the Time Traveller is shocked to find his time machine missing, and eventually works out that it has been dragged by some unknown party into a nearby structure with heavy doors, locked from the inside, which resembles a Sphinx. Later in the dark, he is approached menacingly by the Morlocks, ape-like troglodytes who live in darkness underground and surface only at night. Within their dwellings he discovers the machinery and industry that makes the above-ground paradise possible. He alters his theory, speculating that the human race has evolved into two species: the leisured classes have become the ineffectual Eloi, and the downtrodden working classes have become the brutish light-fearing Morlocks. Deducing that the Morlocks have taken his time machine, he explores the Morlock tunnels, learning that they feed on the Eloi. His revised analysis is that their relationship is not one of lords and servants but of livestock and ranchers. The Time Traveller theorizes that intelligence is the result of and response to danger; with no real challenges facing the Eloi, they have lost the spirit, intelligence, and physical fitness of humanity at its peak. Meanwhile, he saves an Eloi named Weena from drowning as none of the other Eloi take any notice of her plight, and they develop an innocently affectionate relationship over the course of several days. He takes Weena with him on an expedition to a distant structure that turns out to be the remains of a museum, where he finds a fresh supply of matches and fashions a crude weapon against Morlocks, whom he fears he must fight to get back his machine. He plans to take Weena back to his own time. Because the long and tiring journey back to Weena's home is too much for them, they stop in the forest, and they are then overcome by Morlocks in the night, and Weena faints. The Traveller escapes only when a small fire he had left behind them to distract the Morlocks catches up to them as a forest fire; Weena is presumably lost in the fire, as are the Morlocks. The Morlocks use the time machine as bait to ensnare the Traveller, not understanding that he will use it to escape. He travels further ahead to roughly 30 million years from his own time. There he sees some of the last living things on a dying Earth, menacing reddish crab-like creatures slowly wandering the blood-red beaches chasing butterflies in a world covered in simple lichenous vegetation. He continues to make short jumps through time, seeing Earth's rotation gradually cease and the sun grow larger, redder, and dimmer, and the world falling silent and freezing as the last degenerate living things die out.

Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There (1871) is a novel by Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson), the sequel to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865). The themes and settings of Through the Looking-Glass make it a kind of mirror image of Wonderland: the first book begins outdoors, in the warm month of May (4 May), uses frequent changes in size as a plot device, and draws on the imagery of playing cards; the second opens indoors on a snowy, wintry night exactly six months later, on 4 November (the day before Guy Fawkes Night), uses frequent changes in time and spatial directions as a plot device, and draws on the imagery of chess. In it, there are many mirror themes, including opposites, time running backwards, and so on. Short Summary: Alice is playing with a white kitten (whom she calls "Snowdrop") and a black kitten (whom she calls "Kitty")—the offspring of Dinah, Alice's cat in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland—when she ponders what the world is like on the other side of a mirror's reflection. Climbing up on the fireplace mantel, she pokes at the wall-hung mirror behind the fireplace and discovers, to her surprise, that she is able to step through it to an alternative world. In this reflected version of her own house, she finds a book with looking-glass poetry, "Jabberwocky", whose reversed printing she can read only by holding it up to the mirror. She also observes that the chess pieces have come to life, though they remain small enough for her to pick up. Upon leaving the house (where it had been a cold, snowy night), she enters a sunny spring garden where the flowers have the power of human speech; they perceive Alice as being a "flower that can move about." Elsewhere in the garden, Alice meets the Red Queen, who is now human-sized, and who impresses Alice with her ability to run at breathtaking speeds. This is a reference to the chess rule that queens are able to move any number of vacant squares at once, in any direction, which makes them the most "agile" of pieces. The Red Queen reveals to Alice that the entire countryside is laid out in squares, like a gigantic chessboard, and offers to make Alice a queen if she can move all the way to the eighth rank/row in a chess match. This is a reference to the chess rule of Promotion. Alice is placed in the second rank as one of the White Queen's pawns, and begins her journey across the chessboard by boarding a train that literally jumps over the third row and directly into the fourth rank, thus acting on the rule that pawns can advance two spaces on their first move.

In “True Ghost Stories,” Mr. Carrington presents a number of startling cases of this character; but they are not the ordinary “ghost stories”—based on pure fiction, and having no foundation in reality. Here we have a well-arranged collection of incidents, all thoroughly investigated and vouched for, and the testimony obtained first-hand and corroborated by others. The chapter on “Haunted Houses” is particularly striking. The first chapter deals with the interesting question, “What is a Ghost?” and attempts to answer this question in the light of the latest scientific theories which have been advanced to explain these supernatural happenings and visitants. It is a book of absorbing interest, and cannot fail to grip and hold the attention of every reader—no matter whether he be a student of these questions, or one merely in search of hair-raising anecdotes and stories. He will find them here a-plenty! The following little book endeavors to bring together a number of “ghost stories” of the more startling and dramatic type,—but stories, nevertheless, which seem to be well authenticated; and which have been obtained, in most instances, at first hand, from the original witnesses; and often contain corroborative testimony from others who also experienced the ghostly phenomena. Some of these incidents, indeed, rise to the dignity of scientific evidence; others are less well authenticated cases,—but interesting for all that. These have been grouped in various Chapters, according to their evidential value. Chapters II. and III. contain well-evidenced cases, some of which have been taken from the Proceedings and Journals of the Society for Psychical Research (S. P. R.), or from Phantasms of the Living, or from other scientific books, in which narratives of this character receive serious consideration. Chapter V., on the contrary, contains a number of incidents which,—striking and dramatic as they are,—cannot be included in the two earlier Chapters, as presenting real evidence of Ghosts; but are published rather as startling and interesting ghost stories. Chapter IV., devoted to “Haunted Houses,” contains brief accounts of the most famous Haunted Houses, and of the phenomena which have been witnessed within them. Appendix A gives a list of a few of the important “Historical Ghosts,” Appendix B describes the “Phantom Armies” lately seen by the Allied troops in France—while Appendix C lists a number of books of Ghost Stories which the interested reader may care to peruse. A short Glossary, at the beginning of the book, explains the meaning of certain terms used,—which are not, perhaps, ordinarily met with in books of this character. In the Introductory Chapter, I have endeavored to explain, very briefly, the nature and character of Ghosts; what they are; and the various scientific theories which have been brought forward, of late years, to explain Ghosts. I hope that this may prove of interest to the reader; in case it does not do so, he is invited to “skip” directly to Chapter II., which begins our account of “True Ghost Stories.” I wish to express my thanks in this place to the Council of the English S. P. R. for special permission to quote and to summarize several striking cases here reproduced; also to Miss Estelle Stead, for permission to utilize several cases previously printed at length in Mr. Wm. T. Stead’s collections of Ghost Stories. H. C. [Author]

The War of the Worlds is a military science fiction novel by H. G. Wells. It first appeared in serialized form in 1897, published simultaneously in Pearson's Magazine in the UK and Cosmopolitan magazine in the US. The first appearance in book form was published by William Heinemann of London in 1898. It is the first-person narrative of the adventures of an unnamed protagonist and his brother in Surrey and London as Earth is invaded by Martians. Written between 1895 and 1897, it is one of the earliest stories that detail a conflict between mankind and an extraterrestrial race. The novel is one of the most commented-on works in the science fiction canon. The War of the Worlds has two parts, Book One: The Coming of the Martians and Book Two: The Earth under the Martians. The narrator, a philosophically-inclined author, struggles to return to his wife while seeing the Martians lay waste to southern England. Book One also imparts the experience of his brother, also unnamed, who describes events in the capital and escapes the Martians by boarding a ship near Tillingham, on the Essex coast. The plot has been related to invasion literature of the time. The novel has been variously interpreted as a commentary on evolutionary theory, British Imperialism, and generally Victorian superstitions, fears and prejudices. At the time of publication it was classified as a scientific romance, like his earlier novel The Time Machine. The War of the Worlds has been both popular (having never gone out of print) and influential, spawning half a dozen feature films, radio dramas, a record album, various comic book adaptations, a television series, and sequels or parallel stories by other authors. It has even influenced the work of scientists, notably Robert Hutchings Goddard. Plot SummaryYet across the gulf of space, minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us.— H. G. Wells (1898), The War of the Worlds The Coming of the MartiansThe narrative opens in an astronomical observatory at Ottershaw where explosions are seen on the surface of the planet Mars, creating much interest in the scientific community. Later a "meteor" lands on Horsell Common, near the narrator's home in Woking, Surrey. He is among the first to discover that the object is an artificial cylinder that opens, disgorging Martians who are "big" and "greyish" with "oily brown skin," "the size, perhaps, of a bear," with "two large dark-coloured eyes," and a lipless "V-shaped mouth" surrounded by "Gorgon groups of tentacles." The narrator finds them "at once vital, intense, inhuman, crippled and monstrous." They briefly emerge, have difficulty in coping with the Earth's atmosphere, and rapidly retreat into the cylinder. A human deputation (which includes the astronomer Ogilvy) approaches the cylinder with a white flag, but the Martians incinerate them and others nearby with a heat-ray before beginning to assemble their machinery. Military forces arrive that night to surround the common, including Maxim guns. The population of Woking and the surrounding villages are reassured by the presence of the military. A tense day begins, with much anticipation of military action by the narrator.

Кра?на, яку залишили ?? творц?, винах?дники та мислител?, приречена на в?йну, голод ? смерть. Владу захоплюють нев?гласи, корупц?онери й мародери. ?стор?я трива? бодай тому, що одна вольова ж?нка на ?м’я Да?н? Та??арт переконана, що досконалий св?т справжн?х ц?нностей ?сну?. Вона намага?ться зламати сценар?й неминучо? катастрофи. ?? Атлантида не м?ф. У св?т? ще ? см?ливц?, спроможн? створити сусп?льний лад, де нема? конфл?кт?в, не виника? потреби в самопожертв?, жодна людина не становить загрози для мети ?нших. Бунт?вн? атланти знають, що розум таки переможе. Риторичне питання, хто такий Джон ?олт, насправд? ма? в?дпов?дь, а неймов?рн? ?де? — сво? вт?лення, яке проголомшу? людську уяву. В останн?й частин? свого фундаментального роману ?дей Айн Ренд змальову? ц?л?сну ф?лософську систему, яка дос? виклика? палк? дискус??, де в?д захвату до обурення — один крок.

The Metamorphosis (German: Die Verwandlung, also sometimes translated as The Transformation) is a novella by Franz Kafka, first published in 1915. It has been cited as one of the seminal works of fiction of the 20th century and is studied in colleges and universities across the Western world. The story begins with a traveling salesman, Gregor Samsa, waking to find himself transformed (metamorphosed) into a large, monstrous insect-like creature. The cause of Samsa's transformation is never revealed, and Kafka never did give an explanation. The rest of Kafka's novella deals with Gregor's attempts to adjust to his new condition as he deals with being burdensome to his parents and sister, who are repulsed by the horrible, verminous creature Gregor has become. Part I: One day, Gregor Samsa, a traveling salesman, wakes up to find himself transformed into a "ungeheures Ungeziefer", literally "monstrous vermin", often interpreted as a giant bug or insect. He believes it is a dream, and reflects on how dreary life as a traveling salesman is. As he looks at the wall clock, he realizes he has overslept, and missed his train for work. He ponders on the consequences of this delay. Gregor becomes annoyed at how his boss never accepts excuses or explanations from any of his employees no matter how hard working they are, displaying an apparent lack of trusting abilities. Gregor's mother knocks on the door and he answers her. She is concerned for Gregor because he is late for work, which is unorthodox for Gregor. Gregor answers his mother and realizes that his voice has changed, but his answer is short so his mother does not notice the voice change. His sister, Grete, to whom he was very close, then whispers through the door and begs him to open the door. All his family members think that he is ill and ask him to open the door. He tries to get out of bed, but he is incapable of moving his body. While trying to move, he finds that his office manager, the chief clerk, has shown up to check on him. He finally rocks his body to the floor and calls out that he will open the door shortly.

Видано 45 мовами! Донна Тартт — лауреат Пул?тцер?всько? прем?? № 1 у списку 100 видатних книжок за верс??ю The New York Times Отямившись п?сля вибуху в музе?, тринадцятир?чний Тео ще не розум??, що там, п?д уламками, залишилися його мат?р ? його дитинство. Пробираючись до виходу, повз кам?ння та т?ла, в?н п?дбира? безц?нну картину фламандського майстра, яку так любила його мати. Дивний старий, вмираючи, в?дда? йому свого персня та просить винести картину зв?дси... Тео буде кидати ?з родини в родину, ?з Нью-Йорка до Амстердама, ?з глибин в?дчаю до ейфор??. Викрадений ?Щиголь? стане його прокляттям та над??ю на порятунок... Vidano 45 movami! Donna Tartt — laureat Pul?tcer?vs'ko? prem?? № 1 u spisku 100 vidatnih knizhok za vers??ju The New York Times Otjamivshis' p?slja vibuhu v muze?, trinadcjatir?chnij Teo shhe ne rozum??, shho tam, p?d ulamkami, zalishilisja jogo mat?r ? jogo ditinstvo. Probirajuchis' do vihodu, povz kam?nnja ta t?la, v?n p?dbira? bezc?nnu kartinu flamands'kogo majstra, jaku tak ljubila jogo mati. Divnij starij, vmirajuchi, v?dda? jomu svogo persnja ta prosit' vinesti kartinu zv?dsi... Teo bude kidati ?z rodini v rodinu, ?z N'ju-Jorka do Amsterdama, ?z glibin v?dchaju do ejfor??. Vikradenij ?Shhigol'? stane jogo prokljattjam ta nad??ju na porjatunok...

Underground* *The author of the diary and the diary itself are, of course, imaginary. Nevertheless it is clear that such persons as the writer of these notes not only may, but positively must, exist in our society, when we consider the circumstances in the midst of which our society is formed. I have tried to expose to the view of the public more distinctly than is commonly done, one of the characters of the recent past. He is one of the representatives of a generation still living. In this fragment, entitled "Underground," this person introduces himself and his views, and, as it were, tries to explain the causes owing to which he has made his appearance and was bound to make his appearance in our midst. In the second fragment there are added the actual notes of this person concerning certain events in his life.--AUTHOR'S NOTE. II am a sick man.... I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased. However, I know nothing at all about my disease, and do not know for certain what ails me. I don't consult a doctor for it, and never have, though I have a respect for medicine and doctors. Besides, I am extremely superstitious, sufficiently so to respect medicine, anyway (I am well-educated enough not to be superstitious, but I am superstitious). No, I refuse to consult a doctor from spite. That you probably will not understand. Well, I understand it, though. Of course, I can't explain who it is precisely that I am mortifying in this case by my spite: I am perfectly well aware that I cannot "pay out" the doctors by not consulting them; I know better than anyone that by all this I am only injuring myself and no one else. But still, if I don't consult a doctor it is from spite. My liver is bad, well--let it get worse! I have been going on like that for a long time--twenty years. Now I am forty. I used to be in the government service, but am no longer. I was a spiteful official. I was rude and took pleasure in being so. I did not take bribes, you see, so I was bound to find a recompense in that, at least. (A poor jest, but I will not scratch it out. I wrote it thinking it would sound very witty; but now that I have seen myself that I only wanted to show off in a despicable way, I will not scratch it out on purpose!) When petitioners used to come for information to the table at which I sat, I used to grind my teeth at them, and felt intense enjoyment when I succeeded in making anybody unhappy. I almost did succeed. For the most part they were all timid people--of course, they were petitioners. But of the uppish ones there was one officer in particular I could not endure. He simply would not be humble, and clanked his sword in a disgusting way. I carried on a feud with him for eighteen months over that sword. At last I got the better of him. He left off clanking it. That happened in my youth, though. But do you know, gentlemen, what was the chief point about my spite? Why, the whole point, the real sting of it lay in the fact that continually, even in the moment of the acutest spleen, I was inwardly conscious with shame that I was not only not a spiteful but not even an embittered man, that I was simply scaring sparrows at random and amusing myself by it. I might foam at the mouth, but bring me a doll to play with, give me a cup of tea with sugar in it, and maybe I should be appeased. I might even be genuinely touched, though probably I should grind my teeth at myself afterwards and lie awake at night with shame for months after. That was my way.

In these times of ours, though concerning the exact year there is no need to be precise, a boat of dirty and disreputable appearance, with two figures in it, floated on the Thames, between Southwark bridge which is of iron, and London Bridge which is of stone, as an autumn evening was closing in. The figures in this boat were those of a strong man with ragged grizzled hair and a sun-browned face, and a dark girl of nineteen or twenty, sufficiently like him to be recognizable as his daughter. The girl rowed, pulling a pair of sculls very easily; the man, with the rudder-lines slack in his hands, and his hands loose in his waistband, kept an eager look out. He had no net, hook, or line, and he could not be a fisherman; his boat had no cushion for a sitter, no paint, no inscription, no appliance beyond a rusty boathook and a coil of rope, and he could not be a waterman; his boat was too crazy and too small to take in cargo for delivery, and he could not be a lighterman or river-carrier; there was no clue to what he looked for, but he looked for something, with a most intent and searching gaze. The tide, which had turned an hour before, was running down, and his eyes watched every little race and eddy in its broad sweep, as the boat made slight head-way against it, or drove stern foremost before it, according as he directed his daughter by a movement of his head. She watched his face as earnestly as he watched the river. But, in the intensity of her look there was a touch of dread or horror. Allied to the bottom of the river rather than the surface, by reason of the slime and ooze with which it was covered, and its sodden state, this boat and the two figures in it obviously were doing something that they often did, and were seeking what they often sought. Half savage as the man showed, with no covering on his matted head, with his brown arms bare to between the elbow and the shoulder, with the loose knot of a looser kerchief lying low on his bare breast in a wilderness of beard and whisker, with such dress as he wore seeming to be made out of the mud that begrimed his boat, still there was a business-like usage in his steady gaze. So with every lithe action of the girl, with every turn of her wrist, perhaps most of all with her look of dread or horror; they were things of usage. 'Keep her out, Lizzie. Tide runs strong here. Keep her well afore the sweep of it.' Trusting to the girl's skill and making no use of the rudder, he eyed the coming tide with an absorbed attention. So the girl eyed him. But, it happened now, that a slant of light from the setting sun glanced into the bottom of the boat, and, touching a rotten stain there which bore some resemblance to the outline of a muffled human form, coloured it as though with diluted blood. This caught the girl's eye, and she shivered. 'What ails you?' said the man, immediately aware of it, though so intent on the advancing waters; 'I see nothing afloat.' The red light was gone, the shudder was gone, and his gaze, which had come back to the boat for a moment, travelled away again. Wheresoever the strong tide met with an impediment, his gaze paused for an instant. At every mooring-chain and rope, at every stationery boat or barge that split the current into a broad-arrowhead, at the offsets from the piers of Southwark Bridge, at the paddles of the river steamboats as they beat the filthy water, at the floating logs of timber lashed together lying off certain wharves, his shining eyes darted a hungry look. After a darkening hour or so, suddenly the rudder-lines tightened in his hold, and he steered hard towards the Surrey shore. Always watching his face, the girl instantly answered to the action in her sculling; presently the boat swung round, quivered as from a sudden jerk, and the upper half of the man was stretched out over the stern.

Чортова дванадцятка — досить змстовна й влучна характеристика збрки жахв за редакцю неперевершеного Ствена Джонса! Пд одню обкладинкою збран 12 гостроцкавих оповдань менитих майстрв горору. Дж. Гаррс, К. Ньюман, М. рей, Р. Кемпбелл та нш гарантують вам безсонну нч в атмосфер тамничост й мстики… Подейкують, що в паризькому Театр Жаху влаштовують кривав вистави. Тридцятидвохрчна Кейт Рд пдбралася надто близько до розгадки… (Гньоль) Вдомий актор Даррен Ловр на пку популярност… був, аж доки не розгнвав вдьму! (Забуття)Chortova dvanadcjatka — dosit' zmstovna j vluchna harakteristika zbrki zhahv za redakcju neperevershenogo Stvena Dzhonsa! Pd odnju obkladinkoju zbran 12 gostrockavih opovdan' menitih majstrv gororu. Dzh. Garrs, K. N'juman, M. rej, R. Kempbell ta nsh garantujut' vam bezsonnu nch v atmosfer tamnichost j mstiki… Podejkujut', shho v pariz'komu Teatr Zhahu vlashtovujut' krivav vistavi. Tridcjatidvohrchna Kejt Rd pdbralasja nadto bliz'ko do rozgadki… (Gn'ol') Vdomij aktor Darren Lovr na pku populjarnost… buv, azh doki ne rozgnvav vd'mu! (Zabuttja)

In 1861 Captain Grant succeeded Captain Burgess on Matinicus, taking his son with him as assistant. The old keeper left Abby on the rock to instruct the newcomers in their duties, and she performed the task so well that young Grant fell in love with her, and asked her to become his wife. Soon after their marriage she was appointed an assistant keeper. A few years later the husband was made keeper and the wife assistant keeper of White Head, another light on the Maine coast. There they remained until the spring of 1890, when they removed to Middleborough, Mass., intending to pass the balance of their days beyond sight and hearing of the rocks and the waves. But the hunger which the sea breeds in its adopted children was still strong within them, and the fall of 1892 found them again on the coast of Maine, this time at Portland, where the husband again entered the lighthouse establishment, working in the engineers' department of the first lighthouse district. With them until his death lived Captain Grant, who in the closing months of 1890, being then aged eighty-five, retired from the position of keeper of Matinicus light, which he had held for nearly thirty years. Not less lonely, but far more perilous than the life of the keepers of a light like that on Matinicus is the lot of the crew of the South Shoal lightship, whose position twenty-six miles off Sankaty Head, Nantucket Island, makes it the most exposed light-station in the world. Anchored so far out at sea, it is only during the months of summer and autumn that the lighthouse tender ventures to visit it, and its crew from December to May of each year are wholly cut off from communication with the land. It is this, however, that makes the South Shoal lightship a veritable protecting angel of the deep, for it stands guard not only over the treacherous New South Shoal, near which it is anchored, but over twenty-six miles of rips and reefs between it and the Nantucket shore—a wide-reaching ocean graveyard, where bleach the bones of more than a half thousand wrecked and forgotten vessels. The lightship is a stanchly built two-hulled schooner of 275 tons burden, 103 feet long over all, equipped with fore-and-aft lantern masts 71 feet high, and with two masts for sails, each 42 feet high. The lanterns are octagons of glass in copper frames, so arranged that they can be lowered into houses built around the masts. In the forward part of the ship is a huge fog bell, swung ten feet above the deck, which, when foggy weather prevails, as it frequently does for weeks at a time, is kept tolling day and night. A two-inch chain fastened to a "mushroom" anchor weighing upward of three tons holds the vessel in eighteen fathoms of water, but this, so fiercely do the waves beat against it in winter, has not prevented her from going adrift many times. She was two weeks at sea on one of these occasions, and on another she came to anchor in New York Harbor. Life on the South Shoal lightship is at all times a hard and trying one, and, as a matter of fact, the crew are instructed not to expose themselves to danger outside their special line of duty. This, however, does not deter them from frequently risking their lives in rescuing others, and when, several years ago, the City of Newcastle went ashore on one of the shoals near the lightship, all hands, twenty-seven in number, were saved by the South Shoal crew and kept aboard of her over two weeks, until the story of the wreck was signalled to a passing vessel. Isaac H. Grant holds a silver medal given him by the Government for rescuing two men from drowning while he was keeper at White Head; while Frederick Hatch, keeper of the Breakwater station at Cleveland was awarded the gold bar. The last mentioned badge of honor is granted only to one who has twice distinguished himself by a special act of bravery. It was given Hatch in the winter of 1898.

Жасмин, двадцатичетырехлетняя красавица-американка, приезжает в Англию на Рождество погостить у родственников. Герцог Харли подарил ей жеребца, и она решает прокатится верхом. Но из-за разыгравшейся метели ее едва не сбивает машина, за рулем которой сидел граф Сомертон. Через некоторое время, волею судьбы, Жасмин опять встретится с графом, который приютит ее в своем замке после падения с лошади… Эта встреча навсегда изменит их жизнь и подарит им настоящую любовь… Zhasmin, dvadcatichetyrehletnjaja krasavica-amerikanka, priezzhaet v Angliju na Rozhdestvo pogostit' u rodstvennikov. Gercog Harli podaril ej zherebca, i ona reshaet prokatitsja verhom. No iz-za razygravshejsja meteli ee edva ne sbivaet mashina, za rulem kotoroj sidel graf Somerton. Cherez nekotoroe vremja, voleju sud'by, Zhasmin opjat' vstretitsja s grafom, kotoryj prijutit ee v svoem zamke posle padenija s loshadi… Jeta vstrecha navsegda izmenit ih zhizn' i podarit im nastojashhuju ljubov'…

Mon Agent Андрея М. Мелехова – третий роман об Аналитике. Как и предыдущие книги серии – Malaria и Analyste – Mon Agent представляет из себя необычную комбинацию приключенческого романа и мистического триллера. Он предлагает читателю не только получить удовольствие от весьма неожиданных поворотов нескольких сюжетных линий, но и задуматься над широким кругом философских, религиозных и мировоззренческих проблем, волнующих современного человека.Действие романа происходит в Лондоне и Москве, в Раю и в Преисподней. Его персонажами являются террористы и агенты спецслужб, герои Библии и герои тайных операций, великие пророки прошлого и политики настоящего, ангелы Божьи и слуги Сатаны, люди и говорящие животные. В произведении нашлось место большой любви и большой ненависти, острой политической сатире и тонкому юмору. Как и все книги Мелехова, Mon Agent написан для тех, кто способен подвергнуть сомнению догмы, стереотипы и предубеждения, кто может рассмеяться, говоря даже о весьма серьёзных вещах. Если вы хотите узнать, чем простые (и непростые!) смертные смогли помочь вдруг начавшим стареть и умирать обитателям Рая и как отнеслись бы сегодня люди к новому пришествию Христа – эта книга для вас, читатель! Вам предлагается новая редакция романа.

Daylight sometimes hides secrets that darkness will reveal—the Martian's glowing eyes, for instance. But darkness has other dangers.... Joseph Heidel looked slowly around the dinner table at the five men, hiding his examination by a thin screen of smoke from his cigar. He was a large man with thick blond-gray hair cut close to his head. In three more months he would be fifty-two, but his face and body had the vital look of a man fifteen years younger. He was the President of the Superior Council, and he had been in that post—the highest post on the occupied planet of Mars—four of the six years he had lived here. As his eyes flicked from one face to another his fingers unconsciously tapped the table, making a sound like a miniature drum roll. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Five top officials, selected, tested, screened on Earth to form the nucleus of governmental rule on Mars.Heidel's bright narrow eyes flicked, his fingers drummed. Which one? Who was the imposter, the ringer? Who was the Martian?Sadler's dry voice cut through the silence: "This is not just an ordinary meeting then, Mr. President?" Heidel's cigar came up and was clamped between his teeth. He stared into Sadler's eyes. "No, Sadler, it isn't. This is a very special meeting." He grinned around the cigar. "This is where we take the clothes off the sheep and find the wolf."