Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

The Last of the Mohicans

by James Fenimore Cooper, Eliza Gatewood Warren, Naunerle C. Farr

The wild rush of action in this classic frontier adventure story has made The Last of the Mohicans the most popular of James Fenimore Cooper’s Leatherstocking Tales. Deep in the forests of upper New York State, the brave woodsman Hawkeye (Natty Bumppo) and his loyal Mohican friends Chingachgook and Uncas become embroiled in the bloody battles of the French and Indian War. The abduction of the beautiful... (more)

The Scarlet Letter

by Nathaniel Hawthorne

The landscape of this classic novel is uniquely American, but the themes it explores are universal—the nature of sin, guilt, and penitence, the clash between our private and public selves, and the spiritual and psychological cost of living outside society. Constructed with the elegance of a Greek tragedy, The Scarlet Letter brilliantly illuminates the truth that lies deep within the human heart.

Out of Africa

by Isak Dinesen

In this book, the author of Seven Gothic Tales gives a true account of her life on her plantation in Kenya. She tells with classic simplicity of the ways of the country and the natives: of the beauty of the Ngong Hills and coffee trees in blossom: of her guests, from the Prince of Wales to Knudsen, the old charcoal burner, who visited her: of primitive festivals: of big game that were her near neighbors--lions,... (more)

The Mars Trilogy: Book 1

Red Mars

by Kim Stanley Robinson

In his most ambitious project to date, award-winning author Kim Stanley Robinson utilizes years of research and cutting-edge science in the first of three novels that will chronicle the colonization of Mars. For eons, sandstorms have swept the barren desolate landscape of the red planet. For centuries, Mars has beckoned to mankind to come and conquer its hostile climate. Now, in the year 2026, a group of one... (more)

Love in the Time of Cholera

by Gabriel García Márquez

In their youth, Florentino Ariza and Fermino Daza fall passionately in love. When Fermina eventually chooses to marry a wealthy, well-born doctor, Florentino is devastated, but he is a romantic. As he rises in his business career he whiles away the years in 622 affairs--yet he reserves his heart for Fermina. Her husband dies at last, and Florentino purposefully attends the funeral. Fifty years, nine months,... (more)

The Tempest (Cambridge School Shakespeare)

The Tempest (Cambridge School Shakespeare)

by William Shakespeare

This new edition of The Tempest is part of the established Cambridge School Shakespeare series and has been substantially updated with new and revised activities throughout. Remaining faithful to the series' active approach it treats the play as a script to be acted, explored and enjoyed. As well as the complete script of The Tempest, you will find a variety of classroom-tested activities, an eight-page colour... (more)

Finding George Orwell in Burma

by Emma Larkin

In one of the most intrepid travelogues in recent memory, Emma Larkin tells of the year she spent traveling through Burma, using as a compass the life and work of George Orwell, whom many of Burma’s underground teahouse intellectuals call simply "the Prophet." In stirring prose, she provides a powerful reckoning with one of the world’s least free countries. Finding George Orwell in Burma is a brave and... (more)

The Lover

by Marguerite Duras, Barbara Bray

Back in print in paperback, "an exquisite jewel of a novel, as multifaceted as a diamond, as seamless and polished as a pearl" ("Boston Herald"). This edition includes an Introduction by Maxine Hong Kingston that looks back at Duras's world from an intriguing new perspective--that of a visitor to Vietnam today.

The Madonna of Excelsior: A Novel

by Zakes Mda

"A generous, patient, wry and intelligent voice...<that> suggests not just a writer who can seduce us through beautiful language and unfailing humor. We also encounter a writer who has the power to shock and frighten us, to astound and anger and unsettle us...In short, his is a voice for which one should feel not only affection but admiration." --Neil Gordon, New York Times Book Review Selection, Summer... (more)

Heart of Darkness & Selections from the Congo Diary

Heart of Darkness & Selections from the Congo Diary

by Joseph Conrad

With an Introduction by Caryl Phillips Commentary by H.L. Mencken, E.M. Forster, Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemingway, Bertrand Russell, Lionel Trilling, Chiua Achebe, and Philip Gourevitch "Heart of Darkness," which appeared at the very beginning of our century, was a Cassandra cry announcing the end of Victorian Europe, on the verge of transforming itself into the Europe of violence," wrote the critic Czeslaw... (more)

Power of One

by Bryce Courtenay

In this magical novel, an irresistible boy tells the story of his survival and coming of age against the background of South Africa during and just after World War II.

John Adams

by David G. McCullough

In this powerful, epic biography, David McCullough unfolds the adventurous life-journey of John Adams, the brilliant, fiercely independent, often irascible, always honest Yankee patriot -- "the colossus of independence," as Thomas Jefferson called him -- who spared nothing in his zeal for the American Revolution; who rose to become the second President of the United States and saved the country from blundering... (more)

The Color Purple

by Alice Walker

Celie is a poor black woman whose letters tell the story of 20 years of her life, beginning at age 14 when she is being abused and raped by her father and attempting to protect her sister from the same fate, and continuing over the course of her marriage to "Mister," a brutal man who terrorizes her. Celie eventually learns that her abusive husband has been keeping her sister's letters from her and the rage she... (more)

The Tales of Alvin Maker: Book 1

Seventh Son

by Orson Scott Card

American Library Association “Best Books for Young Adults” From the author of Ender’s Game , an unforgettable story about young Alvin Maker: the seventh son of a seventh son. Born into an alternative frontier America where life is hard and folk magic is real, Alvin is gifted with the power. He must learn to use his gift wisely. But dark forces are arrayed against Alvin, and only a young girl with second sight... (more)

Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus

Pastwatch: Book 1

Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus

by Orson Scott Card

In one of the most powerful and thought-provoking novels of his remarkable career, Orson Scott Card interweaves a compelling portrait of Christopher Columbus with the story of a future scientist who believes she can alter human history from a tragedy of bloodshed and brutality to a world filled with hope and healing.

Cry, the Beloved Country

by Alan Paton

Cry, the beloved country, for the unborn child that is the inheritor of our fear. Let him not love the earth too deeply. Let him not laugh too gladly when the water runs through his fingers, nor stand too silent when the setting sun makes red the veld with fire. Let him not be too moved when the birds of his land are singing, nor give too much of his heart to a mountain or valley. For fear will rob him of all if... (more)

Rivers of Blood, Rivers of Gold: Europe's Conquest of Indigenous Peoples

Rivers of Blood, Rivers of Gold: Europe's Conquest of Indigenous Peoples

by Mark Cocker

The past five centuries have witnessed a shocking series of confrontations between European nations and millions of indigenous peoples, and these cultural encounters still resonate strongly to this day. Rivers of Blood, Rivers of Gold is an essential book for understanding the true impact of imperialism. Beautifully and passionately written, it provides a judicious and exhaustively researched indictment of... (more)

Exodus

by Leon Uris

An American nurse and an Israeli freedom fighter get caught up in the re-birth of Israel.

The Rifles (Seven Dreams)

by William T. Vollmann

The latest installment of Vollmann's seven-part epic chronicling the clash of Europeans and Native Americans in the New World. Volume six focuses on the white explorers of the mid-1800s, desperately dreaming of forging a Northwest passage.

Youth; Heart of Darkness; The End of the Tether (Penguin Classics)

Youth; Heart of Darkness; The End of the Tether (Penguin Classics)

by Joseph Conrad, Robert Kimbrough

Conrad's aim was 'by the power of the written word, to make you hear, to make you feel ...before all, to make you see'. "Heart of Darkness", his exploration of European colonialism in Africa and of elusive human values, embodies more profoundly than almost any other modern fiction the difficulty of 'seeing', its relativity and shifting compromise. Portraying a young man's first sea-voyage to the "East in Youth",... (more)

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Browse Subjects: colonialism

Top Books

by James Fenimore Cooper, Eliza Gatewood Warren, Naunerle C. Farr

by Nathaniel Hawthorne

by Isak Dinesen

by Kim Stanley Robinson

by Gabriel García Márquez

by William Shakespeare

by Emma Larkin

by Marguerite Duras, Barbara Bray

by Zakes Mda

by Joseph Conrad

by Bryce Courtenay

by David G. McCullough

by Alice Walker

by Orson Scott Card

by Orson Scott Card

by Alan Paton

by Mark Cocker

by Leon Uris

by William T. Vollmann

by Joseph Conrad, Robert Kimbrough