Penguin Group

Coetzee reinvents the story of Robinson Crusoe, directing our attention to the seduction and tyranny of storytelling itself.

George Orwell's first published work, «Down and Out in Paris and London», is a vivid, sensitive account of the time he lived as one of the poor in the late twenties. In a bug-infested hotel, surviving only between the pawnbroker and a little teaching and writing, Orwell shocked the middle-class establishment with his observation of the misery, the hopelessness and the despair of the poor of a previously unexplored Paris and London.

For Gertrude Stein and her companion Alice B. Toklas, life in Paris was based upon the rue de Fleurus and the Saturday evenings and ‘it was like a kaleidoscope slowly turning’. Picasso was there with ‘his high whinnying spanish giggle’, as were Cezanne and Matisse, Hemingway and Fitzgerald. As Toklas put it – ‘The geniuses came and talked to Gertrude Stein and the wives sat with me’. A light-hearted entertainment, this is in fact Gertrude Stein’s own autobiography and a roll-call of all the extraordinary painters and writers she met between 1903 and 1932. Audacious, sardonic and characteristically self-confident, this is a definitive account by the American in Paris.

Guy Crouchback, determined to get into the war, takes a commission in the Royal Corps of Halberdiers. His spirits high, he sees all the trimmings but none of the action. And his first campaign, an abortive affair on the West African coastline, ends with an escapade which seriously blots his Halberdier copybook. «Men at Arms» is the first book in Waugh’s brilliant trilogy, «Sword of Honour», which chronicles the fortunes of Guy Crouchback. The second and third volumes, «Officers and Gentlemen» and «Unconditional Surrender», are also published in Penguin. «Sword of Honour» has recently been made into a television drama series, with screenplay by William Boyd.

In this second part of John Galworthy's trilogy of love, power, money and family feuding, a new generation has arrived to divide the Forsyte clan with society scandals and conflicting passions.

In this final volume of The Forsyte Saga, Galsworthy writes about the lives and loves of the Cherrell family, cousins of the Forsytes. For centuries, the Cherrell sons have left their home of Condaford Grange to serve the state as soldiers, clergymen and administrators, but the 1930s bring uncertainty in a world of rapidly altering morals and unemployment. Galsworthy's portrayal of the effect of political change on individuals show him as a great social novelist as well as the author of one of the most gripping family sagas ever written.

This work combines the notes of Gardner's 1960 edition with his 1990 update, More Annotated Alice (not published in the UK), as well as additional discoveries drawn from Gardner's knowledge of the texts. It is illustrated with John Tenniel's classic art and recently-discovered pencil sketches.

Such is the strength of Joe Saul's longing for a child, that he feels he is cursed after three unfruitful years of marriage. Yet unbeknown to him, he is sterile. His young wife secretly conceives the child of another man and when Joe discovers her deception, his anguish is greater than ever.

Galsworthy's nine Forsyte novels span 50 years of family decline, from the 1880s to the 1930s. In seeking to insulate themselves by property from reality and the disintegration of their class, the Forsytes are gradually blinded to the threats of social change and the stealthy march of passion.

Amory Blaine, intent on rebelling against his staid, Midwestern upbringing, longs to acquire the patina of Eastern sophistication. In his quest for sexual and intellectual enlightenment, he progresses through a series of relationships, until he is cast out into the real world.

In 1960, when he was almost 60 years old, John Steinbeck set out to rediscover the United States, feeling he might have lost touch with its sights sounds and the essence of its people. This book decribes his travels in a pick-up truck across nearly 40 states with his dog Charlie, a French poodle.

Ethan Allen Hawley has lost the acquisitive spirit of his wealthy forebears. Scarred by failure, Ethan works as a grocery store clerk. But his wife is restless, his teenage children troubled and hungry for material comforts. Then a series of unusual events reignites Ethan's ambition.

When Georgia Abbot`s fiance cheats on her she leaves her humdrum life in London for a job at «Glow» magazine in Sydney, Australia. At first things seem promising, as she`s swept up in a whirl of parties, dancing and debauchery. But Australian men are — oh dear — starting to look all too familiar.

Commissioned by the Left Book club in 1936, George Orwell set out to report on working class life in the bleak industrial heartlands of Yorkshire and Lancashire. The experience profoundly changed him, and in Wigan Pier he unleased a brilliant and bitter polemic that has not lost its force with the passage of time. The first edition of The Road to Wigan Pier' included 32 plates. These illustrations of slum conditions, which give added resonance to Orwell's indictment, are restored in this new edition.

The triffids are a monstrous species of stinging plant; they walk, they talk, they dominate the world. The narrator of this novel wakes up in hospital to find that, by missing the end of the world, he has survived to witness a new world. But the new world that awaits him is fantastic and horrific.

This is a great first poetry book; the poems span time, from Robert Louis Stevenson and Walter de la Mare right up to date with Roger McGough and Michael Rosen. Themes covered, such as mealtimes, playtime, animals, family and bedtime, really appeal to youngreaders.

Madeline's fun-loving spirit and bold personality get her into the greatest adventures. In these five books she turns a trip to the hospital into a grand adventure, tumbles into the river Seine only to be rescued by a fearless dog, runs off to join the circus — and that's just the beginning! Thanks to humorous, lyrical text, breathtaking artwork, and a spunky redhead named Madeline, these books have timeless appeal and perennial popularity.

Madeline is one of the best-loved characters in children's literature. Set in picturesque Paris, this tale of a brave little girl's trip to the hospital was a Caldecott Honor Book in 1940 and has as much appeal today as it did then. The combination of a spirited heroine, timelessly appealing art, cheerful humor, and rhythmic text makes Madeline a perennial favorite with children of all ages. No one has ever written more delightful stories than the Madeline books, whose text and pictures are cherished by parents as well as by youngsters, and which have brightened the evening shadows at many a bedtime.

Originally published at the zenith of Nazi Germany's power, Steinbeck's fable «The Moon Is Down» explores the effects of invasion on both the conquered and the conquerors. Occupied by enemy troops, a small, peaceable town comes face-to-face with evil imposed from the outside and betrayal from within the close-knit community. As he delves into the motivations and emotions of the enemy, Steinbeck uncovers profound and often unsettling truths both about war and human nature.

'In a decade marked, much like our own, by simple fears, John Wyndham refused to make simple metaphors' — M John Harrison. A world paralyzed by genetic mutation: Wyndham takes the reader into the anguished heart of a community where the chances of breeding true are less than fifty percent and where deviations are rooted out and destroyed as abominations.

Outwardly a novel about life in a country-house in whose grounds there is to be a pageant, «Between the Acts» is also a striking evocation of English experience in the months leading up to the Second World War. Through dialogue, humour and the passionate musings of the characters, Virginia Woolf explores how a community is formed (and scattered) over time. The pageant, a series of scenes from English history, and the private dramas that go on between the acts, are closely interlinked. Through the figure of Miss La Trobe, and author of the pageant, Virginia Woolf questions imperialist assumptions and, at the same time, re-creates the elusive role of the artist.

A novel constructed around the last great poem of a fictional American poet, John Shade, and an account of his death. The poem appears in full and the narrative develops through the lengthy, and increasingly eccentric, notes by his posthumous editor.

Follows a man's thoughts and dreams during a single night. It is also a book that participates in the re-reading of Irish history that was part of the revival of the early 20th century. The author also wrote Ulysses, Dubliners and Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man.

Even easier than Level 1 All Aboard Reading books, Picture Readers combine rebus pictures, super-simple vocabulary, and cut-out flash cards to develop and reinforce reading skills. In The Big Snowball, a little boy's runaway snowball causes village-wide calamity! Simple rhyming text and funny illustrations describe the snowball's path through the town, and the silly ending will leave kids giggling.