Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

Comprising three oversized hardback volumes housed in a full-colour slipcase, this edition of Tolkien's classic masterpiece is fully illustrated in watercolour throughout by the acclaimed and award-winning artist, Alan Lee. Since it was first published in 1954, The Lord of the Rings has been a book people have treasured. Steeped in unrivalled magic and otherworldliness, its sweeping fantasy has touched the hearts... (more)

Catch-22

by Joseph Heller

Catch-22 is like no other novel. It is one of the funniest books ever written, a keystone work in American literature, and even added a new term to the dictionary. At the heart of Catch-22 resides the incomparable, malingering bombardier, Yossarian, a hero endlessly inventive in his schemes to save his skin from the horrible chances of war. His efforts are perfectly understandable because as he furiously... (more)

The Lord of the Rings: Book 3

The Return of the King

Being the Third Part of The Lord of the Rings

by J. R. R. Tolkien

The third volume in J.R.R. Tolkien's epic adventure The Lord of the Rings "An extraordinary work -- pure excitement." -- New York Times Book Review "A triumphant close...a grand piece of work, grand in both conception and execution. An astonishing imaginative tour de force." -- Daily Telegraph One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkeness bind them As the... (more)

Anne Of Green Gables: Book 1

Anne of Green Gables

by L. M. Montgomery

Anne Shirley was a special girl with an enormous imagination, an orphan girl who dreamed of the day when she could call herself Anne of Green Gables.

The Chronicles of Narnia: Book 2

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

by C. S. Lewis

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is a fantasy novel for children by C. S. Lewis. Written in 1950 and set in approximately 1940, it is the first-published book of The Chronicles of Narnia and is the best known book of the series.

Macbeth

by William Shakespeare

Each edition includes: • Freshly edited text based on the best early printed version of the play • Full explanatory notes conveniently placed on pages facing the text of the play • Scene-by-scene plot summaries • A key to famous lines and phrases • An introduction to reading Shakespeare's language • An essay by an outstanding scholar providing a modern perspective on the play • Illustrations from the Folger... (more)

Oliver Twist

or, The Parish Boy's Progress

by Charles Dickens

A young boy flees from an orphanage to London, only to be captured by thieves.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

by Betty Smith

Francie Nolan, avid reader, penny-candy connoisseur, and adroit observer of human nature, has much to ponder in colorful, turn-of-the-century Brooklyn. She grows up with a sweet, tragic father, a severely realistic mother, and an aunt who gives her love too freely--to men, and to a brother who will always be the favored child. Francie learns early the meaning of hunger and the value of a penny. She is her... (more)

The Good Earth

by Pearl S. Buck

ENDURING LITERATURE ILLUMINATED BY PRACTICAL SCHOLARSHIP A poignant tale about the life and labors of a Chinese farmer during the sweeping reign of the country¹s last emperor. EACH ENRICHED CLASSIC EDITION INCLUDES: • A concise introduction that gives readers important background information • A chronology of the author's life and work • A timeline of significant events that provides the book's historical... (more)

The Lord of the Rings: Book 2

The Two Towers

Being the Second Part of The Lord of the Rings

by J. R. R. Tolkien

The second volume in J.R.R. Tolkien's epic adventure The Lord of the Rings "Here are beauties which pierce like swords or burn like cold iron." -- C. S. Lewis "Among the greatest works of imaginative fiction of the twentieth century. The book presents us with the richest profusion of new lands and new creatures, from the beauty of Lothlorien to the horror of Mordor, adventures to hold us spell-bound, and words... (more)

East of Eden

by John Steinbeck

Today, nearly forty years after his death, Nobel Prize winner John Steinbeck remains one of America’s greatest writers and cultural figures. We have begun publishing his many works for the first time as blackspine Penguin Classics featuring eye-catching, newly commissioned art. This season we continue with the seven spectacular and influential books East of Eden, Cannery Row, In Dubious Battle, The Long... (more)

Lolita

by Vladimir Nabokov

Awe and exhiliration--along with heartbreak and mordant wit--abound in Lolita , Nabokov's most famous and controversial novel, which tells the story of the aging Humbert Humbert's obsessive, devouring, and doomed passion for the nymphet Dolores Haze. Lolita is also the story of a hypercivilized European colliding with the cheerful barbarism of postwar America. Most of all, it is a meditation on love--love as... (more)

Watership Down

by Richard Adams

One of the most beloved novels of our time, Richard Adams's Watership Down takes us to a world we have never truly seen: to the remarkable life that teems in the fields, forests and riverbanks far beyond our cities and towns. It is a powerful saga of courage, leadership and survival; an epic tale of a hardy band of adventurers forced to flee the destruction of their fragile community...and their trials and... (more)

The Old Man and the Sea

by Ernest Hemingway

Hemingway's last work published during his lifetime remains one of his most popular and best known. A man's symbolic quest to land the catch of a lifetime engages classic themes of the human struggle against nature as well as explores the intersection of expectation and desire. Filled with fresh essays about the book, the new edition of this invaluable literary guide features a bibliography and notes on the essay... (more)

A Christmas Carol

Being a Ghost Story of Christmas

by Charles Dickens

This Prestwick House Literary Touchstone Edition includes a glossary and reader’s notes to help the reader fully appreciate the beauty and humor of Dickens’s work. In his "Ghostly little book," Charles Dickens invents the modern concept of Christmas Spirit and offers one of the world’s most adapted and imitated stories. We know Ebenezer Scrooge, Tiny Tim, and the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future,... (more)

Slaughterhouse-Five

Or, the Children's Crusade: A Duty Dance with Death

by Kurt Vonnegut

Launched in November, Dell's Kurt Vonnegut reissue program continues with one of the world's great anti-war books. Centering on the infamous firebombing of Dresden, Billy Pilgrim's odyssey through time reflects the mythic journey of our own fractured lives as we search for meaning in what we are afraid to know.

The Giver: Book 1

The Giver

by Lois Lowry

When Jonas turns 12, he is singled out to receive special training from The Giver. Now, it’s time for Jonas to receive the truth. There is no turning back. Everybody has a role to do in the community when ever they turn 12 years old of age.

The Odyssey

by Homer, Allen Mandelbaum, Stanley Lombardo, Geraldine McCaughrean, Richmond Lattimore

If The Iliad is the world's greatest war epic, then The Odyssey is literature's grandest evocation of everyman's journey though life. Odysseus's reliance on his wit and wiliness for survival in his encounters with divine and natural forces during his ten-year voyage home to Ithaca after the Trojan War is at once a timeless human story and an individual test of moral endurance. ...

Where the Red Fern Grows

by Wilson Rawls

First published in 1961, a modern-day classic for children follows the friendship between a boy and his two dogs as they search out adventure along the dark hills and river bottoms of Cherokee country. Reprint.

Les Misérables

by Victor Hugo

ENDURING LITERATURE ILLUMINATED BY PRACTICAL SCHOLARSHIP An ex-convict struggles for redemption in the punishing world of post-Napoleonic France. EACH ENRICHED CLASSIC EDITION INCLUDES: • A concise introduction that gives readers important background information • A chronology of the author's life and work • A timeline of significant events that provides the book's historical context • An outline of key... (more)

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Browse Subjects: classic

Top Books

by J. R. R. Tolkien

by Joseph Heller

Being the Third Part of The Lord of the Rings

by J. R. R. Tolkien

by L. M. Montgomery

by C. S. Lewis

by William Shakespeare

or, The Parish Boy's Progress

by Charles Dickens

by Betty Smith

by Pearl S. Buck

Being the Second Part of The Lord of the Rings

by J. R. R. Tolkien

by John Steinbeck

by Vladimir Nabokov

by Richard Adams

by Ernest Hemingway

Being a Ghost Story of Christmas

by Charles Dickens

Or, the Children's Crusade: A Duty Dance with Death

by Kurt Vonnegut

by Lois Lowry

by Homer, Allen Mandelbaum, Stanley Lombardo, Geraldine McCaughrean, Richmond Lattimore

by Wilson Rawls

by Victor Hugo