Description Details
This book of favorite fairy tales was compiled and illustrated by Peter Newell. it includes Jack The Giant Killer; Cinderella; Sleeping Beauty; Little Red Riding Hood; Aladin and the Wonderful Lamp, The Ugly Duckling, Beauty and the Beast, Snow White and Rose Red, The Wild Swans, Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves, and 4 others that are not so famous. The stories included were based upon the those that various famous men remembered as their favorites when children(Summary by Phil Chenevert)...

Excerpt Details
Fiction, Children, Fairy tales

Description Details
The Adventures of Buster Bear is another set of children’s stories by the conservationist, Thornton W. Burgess. Buster Bear has many adventures and misadventures as he meets the different characters in the Green Forest near the Laughing Brook. Along the way, we learn about the habits of Buster and his friends and we learn little lessons about life such as the importance of sharing, not stealing, making friends and not sticking one's head into tin pails. (Summary by John Lieder)...

Excerpt Details
Fiction, Children, Fantasy, Nature

Description Details
A villainous vicar insinuates himself into the life of a wealthy but foolish widow, ruining the fortunes and happiness of her three children, until they begin to fight back. Published in 1837 by the mother of the better-known Anthony Trollope, this highly readable romance portrays the evangelical movement of the Anglican church in a shocking light that may remind readers of some of the religious abuses of the present day. (Summary by Angela Rowland)...

Excerpt Details
Fiction, Romance

Description Details
How should a seven year old child react when forced to be separated from a mother who meant everything to her? How should she react when she learns that the aunt with whom she was sent to live doesn't really care about her? Will she be able to make real friendships with people outside her family? Would she be able to take her belief in God as a comfort? If you want to find answers to all these questions, read the enjoyable novel The Wide, Wide World. There, you will see how the amazing Ellen Montgomery reacts to all those things, and many, many more. Summary by Stav Nisser....

Excerpt Details
Fiction, Literature

Description Details
A wonderful book in which we meet the lucky little bunny who becomes Mrs. Peter Rabbit! This is one of many delightful animal books written by Thornton W. Burgess. I grew up reading and enjoying these tales of talking animals with fun and varied personalities. Peter Rabbit is a character loved by all, and this charming tale recounts the adventures of meeting, wooing, and marrying Mrs. Peter Rabbit. (Introduction by CLW Rollins)...

Excerpt Details
Children, Fiction, Animals

Description Details
Elizabeth Gaskell's last novel was serialized in Cornhill Magazine from 1864 to 1866, and completed by her editor posthumously. It looks at English life in the 1830s through the experiences of Molly Gibson, the daughter of a widowed doctor growing up in the provincial town of Hollingford. When Mr. Gibson decides to marry again, Molly is forced to contend with a pretentious stepmother, but consoled by a close friendship with Cynthia, her new stepsister. The girls' relations with the local residents, particularly the Squire of Hamley Hall and his family, make for incidents comic, romantic, and tragic, by turns. (Summary by Elizabeth Klett)...

Excerpt Details
Fiction, Literature, Romance

Description Details
Tania's grandma has planned a surprise for her on Saturday afternoon. Tania is excited about it. But then her best friend invites her to a movie she really wants to see. And that is on Saturday too. Poor Tania does not want to hurt grandma's feelings but she does so want to go for the movie with her friend. What will she do now? Read on and find out. Suitable to be read to children of ages 3 to 7....

Description Details
Told as a parable, and vividly observed, Rich Shapero’s Too Far is an exhilarating and heart-breaking story of an end to innocence that captures the triumphs and follies of the child’s imagination as it struggles to remain boundless and free....

Description Details
A collection of oddly surreal stories for unusual children, featuring a mouse and his friends - a squirrel, an elephant, a limpet and a fish - along with an assortment of mischievous clouds and cowardly mushrooms....

Description Details
Enter the world of Snapdragon Alley, where every so often very strange things happen in a far corner of the city of Spring Hill Lake. Beginning as children, Alex and Argus Kirkham and their friend Sapphire Karadjian encounter the whatever-it-is and find themselves repeatedly drawn into its orbit. Is it a sentient wormhole to another dimension? Is it a creature of vast and unusual appetites? Is it even a thing or a place at all, and will anyone ever unravel its essence? Four episodes in the lives of these three people over a period of fifty years explore the mysterious worlds of Dragon City in four short novels, including Snapdragon Alley, Freak City, Dragon Town and the new, fourth and final story in the series, Happy Slumbers, in which all questions are answered, and all ends are tied....

Description Details
An American Robinson Crusoe is a short version of the original story. An indolent, rebellious teen goes on a marine voyage against his parents' wishes. The ship (and all of its crew) is lost in a storm, but Robinson makes it to a deserted island. He has no tools, no weapons, but he lives for over 28 years on the island. He befriends many animals on the island and after over 20 years living solo, he is joined by a young savage who becomes his constant companion. The transformation from the young, lazy teen to a self-sustaining, incredibly knowledgeable adult is one of the major themes in the story. (Summary by: Allyson Hester)...

Excerpt Details
Fiction, Adventure

Description Details
Science fiction (abbreviated SF or sci-fi with varying punctuation and case) is a broad genre of fiction that often involves sociological and technical speculations based on current or future science or technology. This is a reader-selected collection of short stories that entered the US public domain when their copyright was not renewed. Summary by Cori Samuel, with Wikipedia input....

Excerpt Details
Fiction, Science fiction, Short stories

Description Details
Ralph Rover is a traveler at heart, and has always dreamed of shipping out to the South Seas islands. He finally convinces his aging parents to let him go and find his way in the world. But the islands that Ralph finds are not as idyllic as in his dreams. Shipwrecked on a large, uninhabited island, Ralph and his fellow survivors, Jim and Peterkin, discover a world of hostile natives and villainous pirates. Danger, high adventure, and wonders of the sea greet them at every turn. When all seems lost, they find help from an unexpected source. (Summary by Tom Weiss)...

Excerpt Details
Fiction, Teen/Young adult, Adventure

Description Details
Anne Elliott, Jane Austen's only aging heroine, has devoted her life to caring for her financially irresponsible family. Just when she is growing content with her uneventful lifestyle, a long-lost flame re-enters the picture -- now as the beau of her significantly younger cousin. Anne is now faced with a choice: will she watch Captain Wentworth settle into life with another woman, or will she strive to win back his love and escape her family? (Summary by Kirsten Ferreri)...

Excerpt Details
Romance

Description Details
Treasure Island is an adventure novel, a thrilling tale of buccaneers and buried gold. Traditionally considered a coming of age story, it is an adventure tale of superb atmosphere, character and action, and also a wry commentary on the ambiguity of morality—as seen in Long John Silver—unusual for children's literature then and now. (Summary from wikipedia.org)...

Excerpt Details
Adventure

Description Details
The two eldest Dashwood sisters, Elinor and Marianne, one of whom (Elinor) embraces practicality and restraint while the other (Marianne) gives her whole heart to every endeavor. When the Dashwoods - mother Mrs. Dashwood, Elinor, Marianne, and youngest sister Margaret - are sent, almost impoverished, to a small cottage in Devonshire after the death of their father and the machinations of their brother's wife, they accept their new circumstances with as much cheer as they can muster even though their brother and his wife have taken over the family estate and fortune. Marianne finds herself falling in love with the dashing Willoughby, who ends up being not all that he appears. Elinor, the more sensible of the two, falls for Edward Ferrars, a match that seems much more suitable. All of these pleasant connections are, however, soon disrupted. Willoughby leaves and ignores Marianne. Elinor finds out an unexpected secret about Ferrars that puts her on her caution in pursuing their relationship. As these complications develop, Marianne soon finds herself distraught despite having attracted another suitor, the reliable, but older, Colonel B...

Excerpt Details
Romance

Description Details
This classic story by Margery Williams, published in 1922, imparts the timeless message that toys need not be expensive or modern to be appreciated. Through giving and receiving love, even a commonplace stuffed animal can become real in the eyes of a child. This recording, read by a mother and daughter, is dedicated to Barbara Bear, who is real....

Excerpt Details
Children

Description Details
When Beale and Ida Farange are divorced, the court decrees that their only child, the very young Maisie, will shuttle back and forth between them, spending six months of the year with each. The parents are immoral and frivolous, and they use Maisie to intensify their hatred of each other. (Summary by Wikipedia.)...

Excerpt Details
Literature

Description Details
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884) by Mark Twain is one of the truly great American novels, beloved by children, adults, and literary critics alike. The book tells the story of “Huck” Finn (first introduced as Tom Sawyer’s sidekick in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer ), his friend Jim, and their journey down the Mississippi River on a raft. Both are on the run, Huck from his drunk and abusive father, and Jim as a runaway slave. As Huck and Jim drift down the river, they meet many colorful characters and have many great adventures. The true heart of the story, however, is the friendship between Huck and Jim. A constant theme throughout the book is Huck’s internal struggle between what he has been taught, that helping a runaway slave is a sin, and what he truly believes, that Jim is a good man and it couldn’t possibly be wrong to help him. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was unique at the time of its publication (1884) because it is narrated by Huck himself and is written in the numerous dialects common in the area and time in which the book is set. Although the book was originally intended as a sequel to the children’s book The Adventu...

Excerpt Details
Children

Description Details
A collection of Classical children's nursery rhymes. Many familiar, a few unfamiliar, all simple and easy for younger children.

Excerpt Details
Children