Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

"Community, Identity, Stability" is the motto of Aldous Huxley's utopian World State. Here everyone consumes daily grams of soma, to fight depression, babies are born in laboratories, and the most popular form of entertainment is a "Feelie," a movie that stimulates the senses of sight, hearing, and touch. Though there is no violence and everyone is provided for, Bernard Marx feels something is missing and senses... (more)

White Noise (Contemporary American Fiction)

White Noise (Contemporary American Fiction)

by Don Delillo

Jack Gladney, a professor of Nazi history at a Middle American liberal arts school, and his family try to handle normal family life as a black cloud of lethal gaseous fumes threatens their town.

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 Farewell to Arms

by Ernest Hemingway

The best American novel to emerge from World War I, A Farewell to Arms is the unforgettable story of an American ambulance driver on the Italian front and his passion for a beautiful English nurse. Hemingway's frank portrayal of the love between Lieutenant Henry and Catherine Barkley, caught in the inexorable sweep of war, glows with an intensity unrivaled in modern literature, while his description of the... (more)

The Sun Also Rises

by Ernest Hemingway

The quintessential novel of the Lost Generation, The Sun Also Rises is one of Ernest Hemingway's masterpieces and a classic example of his spare but powerful writing style. A poignant look at the disillusionment and angst of the post-World War I generation, the novel introduces two of Hemingway's most unforgettable characters: Jake Barnes and Lady Brett Ashley. The story follows the flamboyant Brett and the... (more)

Southern Vampire Mysteries: Book 1

Dead Until Dark

by Charlaine Harris

Sookie Stackhouse is just a small-time cocktail waitress in small-town Louisiana. Until the vampire of her dreams walks into her life-and one of her coworkers checks out.... Maybe having a vampire for a boyfriend isn't such a bright idea. A fun, fast, funny, and wonderfully intriguing blend of vampire and mystery that's hard to put down, and should not be missed. (Susan Sizemore) Praise for Charlaine Harris: ... (more)

Dubliners

by James Joyce

The publication of James Joyce's Dubliners in 1914 was the result of ten years battling with publishers, resisting their demands to remove swear words, real place names and much else. Although only twenty-four when he signed his first publishing contract for the book, Joyce already knew its worth: to alter it in any way would "retard the course of civilization in Ireland." Joyce's aim was to tell the truth-- to... (more)

The Martian Chronicles

by Ray Bradbury

Collection of stories about man's attempts to explore and settle Mars.

The Vampire Chronicles: Book 1

Interview With the Vampire

by Anne Rice

The time is now.We are in a small room with the vampire, face to face, as he speaks - as he pours out the hypnotic, shocking, moving, and erotically charged confessions of his first two hundred years as one of the leaving dead ...

Naked Lunch. First paperback edition of the complete Grove Press hardback edition.

His Dark Materials: Book 1

The Golden Compass (Northern Lights)

by Philip Pullman

"SUPERB . . . WONDER-FILLED." --The Washington Post Book World It was no ordinary life for a young girl: living among scholars in the hallowed halls of Jordan College and tearing unsupervised through Oxford's motley streets on mad quests for adventure. But Lyra's greatest adventure would begin closer to home, the day she heard hushed talk of an extraordinary particle. Microscopic in size, the magical dust--found... (more)

Aldous Huxley's IslandAldous Huxley

Aldous Huxley's Island

by Aldous Huxley

The Stainless Steel Rat's Revenge (Stainless Steel Rat Books (Paperback))

The Stainless Steel Rat's Revenge (Stainless Steel Rat Books (Paperback))

by Harry Harrison

The second adventure of slippery Jim diGriz the Robin Hood of the far future, robbing the rich to give to the even richer...himself.

Coriolanus

by William Shakespeare

"The New Penguin Shakespeare" offers a complete edition of the plays and poems. Each volume has been newly prepared from the original texts and includes an introduction, a list of further reading, a commentary, and a short account of the textual problems of the play.

Chicken Soup for the Golfer's Soul

by Jack Canfield

This inspiring collection of 101 stories from professionals, caddies, and amateur golfers shares the memorable moments of the game when, despite all odds, an impossible shot lands in the perfect position; when a game becomes a lesson in life.

No Fixed Address: An Amorous Journey (Inprints Series)

No Fixed Address: An Amorous Journey (Inprints Series)

by Aritha Van Herk

Winner of the Writers' Guild of Alberta Award for Fiction Nominated for the Governor General's Award for Fiction Arachne Manteia is a road rider, a traveling sales rep who drives a classic Mercedes and peddles women's underwear for a living. From her working class childhood to her comfortable adult life, Arachne refuses the conventional and embraces whatever adventure fate throws in her path. A... (more)

Riddley Walker -Russell Hoban