Revenge
Sir Walter Scott called revenge "the sweetest morsel to the mouth that was ever cooked in hell." We are often counseled to rise above slights, grievances, and injuries, but still, the temptation and promise of revenge remain. This thematic collection gathers texts that investigate what prompts us to hunger for revenge and where this hunger leads us.
Originally published in 2011, A Dance With Dragons is the fifth volume of George R. R. Martin’s epic fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire. Set in the aftermath of the events in A Feast for Crows, the narrative follows along as important characters reckon with the new roles thrust upon them and the consequences of their actions. Martin’s work has gained him multiple Locus Awards, and A Dance with Dragons has been adapted... Read A Dance With Dragons Summary
Address Unknown (1938) by American writer Kathrine Taylor details the rise of Nazi Germany through the correspondence of two men, one of whom is Jewish and one of whom is not. The short novel explores themes such as Radicalization, The Impact of Paranoia and Fascism, and The Loss of Friendship and Family.Chapter 1 Summary: “November 12, 1932”A Jewish German man named Max writes to his business partner, a German gentile, or individual who isn’t Jewish... Read Address Unknown Summary
Agamemnon is an Attic tragedy—a work of the fifth century BCE in Athens—composed by Aeschylus (circa 525-circa 456 BCE). The play was first performed at the City Dionysia in 458 BCE. Agamemnon was the first part of the Oresteia, Aeschylus’s trilogy on the murder of Agamemnon and its grisly aftermath. It was followed by the tragedies Libation Bearers and Eumenides, which also survived, and by a satyr play titled Proteus, which was lost. The play... Read Agamemnon Summary
A Game of Thrones is a 1996 epic fantasy novel by George R. R. Martin and is the first in his long-running A Song of Ice and Fire series. The novel introduces the audience to the fictional world of Westeros, where characters become embroiled in a complicated web of plots, conspiracies, and betrayals as they pursue power. A Game of Thrones won numerous awards on publication and was adapted for television in 2011. This guide... Read A Game of Thrones Summary
A Great Reckoning (2016) is the 12th novel in the Inspector Gamache series. The series consists of contemporary mysteries written by the Canadian author Louise Penny. Like the other novels in the series, A Great Reckoning revolves around the small village of Three Pines, Quebec, and its inhabitants. The novel includes a standalone murder mystery plot and references to events in other novels within the series; Penny explores themes of parenthood, loss, and betrayal. This... Read A Great Reckoning Summary
A House for Mr. Biswas is a 1961 historical fiction novel by V. S. Naipaul. The story takes a postcolonial perspective of the life of a Hindu Indian man in British-owned and occupied Trinidad. Now regarded as one of Naipaul's most significant novels, A House for Mr. Biswas has won numerous awards and has been adapted as a musical, a radio drama, and a television show. Naipaul is also known for the works The Mimic... Read A House for Mr. Biswas Summary
A Man of the People is a 1966 novel by Chinua Achebe. Achebe, a Nigerian novelist and well-known figure of African literature, also wrote Things Fall Apart (1958) and Arrow of God (1964). A Man of the People chronicles political unrest in an African nation that only recently gained its independence from Britain. The novel opens with the narrator, Odili Samalu, awaiting the arrival of Minister Nanga, also known as Chief Nanga, at Anata Grammar... Read A Man of the People Summary
A Painted House, a novel by #1 New York Times bestselling author John Grisham, tells the story of seven-year-old Luke Chandler coming of age in Black Oak, Arkansas, in 1952. The novel focuses on a fateful autumn in which one of the workers on Luke’s family’s cotton farm murders a local man. Luke, as one of the only witnesses to the murder, must navigate the tensions that arise as his loyalty to his family is... Read A Painted House Summary
A Soldier’s Play (1981) was written by Charles Fuller. It premiered off-Broadway with the Negro Ensemble Company in 1981, and was arguably the company’s most successful work to date. It ran for nearly 500 performances and earned the Critics Circle Best Play Award and the 1982 Pulitzer Prize for drama. The play is loosely based on Herman Melville’s Billy Budd (1924), an unfinished novella about a well-liked, handsome sailor who is falsely accused of a... Read A Soldier's Play Summary
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet (1887) is a detective novel about a mysterious murder in a vacant house, one man’s lifelong hunt for justice, and the powers of deduction and reason. It marks the introduction of the famed detective character Sherlock Holmes and his sidekick John Watson, along with several other characters and locations that would become important to the 56 short stories and three other novels about Holmes that followed. The... Read A Study in Scarlet Summary
A Thousand Acres is a historical fiction novel by the American author Jane Smiley. Taking place on an Iowa farm in the 1970s, the novel is a contemporary retelling of William Shakespeare’s tragedy King Lear. Shakespeare’s play focuses on King Lear as he determines which of his three daughters will inherit his kingdom depending on how much they flatter him. Smiley’s novel reimagines Shakespeare’s tragedy on an Iowa farm in the 1970s as Larry Cook... Read A Thousand Acres Summary
The 2016 suspense novel Behind Closed Doors, by B.A. Paris, is a story about a perfect-looking marriage that is anything but what it appears to be on the surface. The novel is narrated in both the present and past tenses by the protagonist, Grace Angel. These tenses are reflected in alternating “Present” and “Past” chapters. In this way, Paris builds backstory and current action into storylines that build in parallel and meet at the end... Read Behind Closed Doors Summary
One of the most influential Christian novels of the 19th century, Lew Wallace’s Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ is a classic historical fiction story of redemption and forgiveness, reimagining the stories of peripheral biblical figures, from Roman tax collectors and charioteers, to people with leprosy, fishermen, Pharisees, shepherds, John the Baptist, and Pontius Pilate. The story traces the life of the fictional main character Judah Ben-Hur, a Jewish nobleman from Jerusalem whose future is... Read Ben-Hur Summary
Blood Meridian, a 1985 historical fiction novel by Cormac McCarthy, is one of the most celebrated works of modern American literature. The novel was inspired by people and events of the mid-19th century in the borderlands of the United States and Mexico. McCarthy’s works have won many honors including the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize. Blood Meridian is often considered his greatest novel. This guide uses an eBook version of the 1992 First Vintage... Read Blood Meridian Summary
Blood Wedding, a Spanish rural tragedy, was written by Federico Garcia Lorca in 1932 while he was director of the travelling theater company Teatro Universitario La Barraca. The play was first performed at Teatro Beatriz in Madrid in 1933 under the title Bodas de Sangre. It ran briefly in America on Broadway in 1935, where it was retitled Bitter Oleander. It was not well received; the passions and folkloric culture in the play were too... Read Blood Wedding Summary
Stephen King’s Carrie is a supernatural horror novel originally published in 1974—the fourth novel King wrote but the first he published. The work became a bestseller upon the release of its paperback edition, setting King’s career in motion, and continues to be highly regarded. In the 1990s schools frequently banned it for its violent content, depictions of sexuality, and portrayal of fundamentalist Christianity. Carrie has been adapted several times, most notably as a 1976 film... Read Carrie Summary
Catching Fire (2009) is the sequel to The New York Times bestseller The Hunger Games (2008), and the second novel in author Suzanne Collins’s trilogy of the same name. Catching Fire is a young adult dystopian science fiction novel that takes place in the future, amidst the ruins of what was once America. Catching Fire details the aftermath of Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark’s victory in the 74th Hunger Games from the first novel. Despite... Read Catching Fire Summary
Child of God (1973) is the third novel by American Pulitzer Prize–winning author Cormac McCarthy. Like McCarthy’s first two novels, Child of God is a Gothic horror set in Appalachia. The story follows the deterioration of 27-year-old Lester Ballard after he is violently dispossessed of his family farm and becomes a serial killer. Through Lester’s extreme isolation and moral corruption, McCarthy explores the themes of Fate in a World Without Grace, The Violence Inherent to... Read Child of God Summary
Chronicle of a Death Foretold is a 1981 novella by Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez. Told in non-chronological order and in journalistic fashion by an unnamed narrator, it pieces together the events leading up to and after the murder of Santiago Nasar by Pedro and Pablo Vicario. Chronicle of a Death Foretold is a classic example of Márquez's use of magical realism in his writing. The novella has been adapted several times as a film... Read Chronicle of a Death Foretold Summary
City of Bones by Cassandra Clare (Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2007) is the first in the Mortal Instruments series of young adult urban fantasy novels, followed by City of Ashes. The book follows a seemingly ordinary 15-year-old girl as she learns she is descended from an ancient race of demon hunters. City of Bones is a New York Times bestseller and inspired several media adaptations, including a graphic novel of the same name (3rd World... Read City of Bones Summary
Dangerous Liaisons is an epistolary novel (i.e., a story told through a series of letters) first published in 1782, seven years before the start of the French Revolution, by Pierre-Ambroise-François Choderlos de Laclos. The story revolves around the scheming and manipulative activities of two aristocrats, the Marquise de Merteuil and the Vicomte de Valmont. They take pleasure in seducing and ruining the reputations of others, using their wit and charm to manipulate those around them... Read Dangerous Liaisons Summary
Doctor Sleep is a 2013 horror novel by Stephen King. It is a sequel to the events that occurred in King’s popular novel The Shining and features the return of Danny Torrance. Decades after the horrors at the Overlook Hotel, Dan Torrance must now reckon with the renewed threat of the spirits. When the novel begins, the dead woman from the Overlook’s Room 217 has returned and threatens Danny in his bathroom. King uses this... Read Doctor Sleep Summary
Olga Tokarczuk is among Poland’s most famous and critically acclaimed contemporary authors. She has received multiple national and international literary awards, including the 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature. Her most well-known novels and their translation dates into English are House of Day, House of Night (2003), Primeval and Other Times (2010), Flights (2018), and The Books of Jacob (2021).Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead was published in Poland in 2009 but didn’t... Read Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead Summary
“Dry September,” by American author William Faulkner, is a short story that explores racial tension, violence, and moral decay in a small Southern town when a white woman’s accusation against a Black man leads to violence. The story, which unfolds in five parts, revolves around the rumors that Will Mayes, a Black man, assaulted or frightened a white woman, Miss Minnie Cooper. Without concrete evidence, the men of the town exact their revenge against Mayes... Read Dry September Summary
Duma Key by Stephen King is a novel in the literary-horror genre, praised for its eerie, spooky atmosphere and suspenseful build-up. Published in 2008, Duma Key is the first novel by King to be set in Florida. The book follows Edgar Freemantle as he moves from Minnesota to the island of Duma (one of the Florida Keys, or small islands) after a life-changing accident. Tormented by phantom-limb pain from his amputation and unable to remember... Read Duma Key Summary
Ellen Foster is a work of adult fiction by US novelist Kaye Gibbons, first published by Algonquin Books in 1987. The novel was Gibbons’s debut, and it won the Sue Kaufman Prize for literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and a notable citation from the Ernest Hemingway Foundation. Critics praised the novel for its unsentimental outlook and the wry, distinct voice of its protagonist. Ellen, a young girl living in the American... Read Ellen Foster Summary
Eumenides is an Attic tragedy by the playwright Aeschylus (circa 525/4-circa 456/5 BCE). Eumenides was the final part of the Oresteia, a tragic trilogy first produced for the City Dionysia in 458 BCE. The Oresteia describes the murder of Agamemnon by his wife Clytemnestra and the aftermath of this act; in Eumenides, Orestes—the son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra—must undergo a trial to be purified of the blood of his mother, whom he murdered to avenge... Read Eumenides Summary
“Fleur” is a magical realist short story by Chippewa American author Louise Erdrich. It was first published in Esquire in 1986 and won an O. Henry Award, a prize for excellence in short story writing. Erdrich expanded on the story and characters in her novel Tracks, published in 1988. This guide, which discusses sexual abuse, uses the version of “Fleur” published in the 2009 collection The Red Convertible: Selected and New Stories 1978-2008. The narrator... Read Fleur Summary
Pubished in 2007, Flight: A Novel is Sherman Alexie's—one of the best-known and most lauded Native American writers—work of historical fiction and fantasy. Alexie—a Washington State native, like his protagonist—is a noteable poet, novelist, and screenwriter. He both wrote and produced the 1998 film, Smoke Signals, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and won both the Audience Award and the Filmmaker’s Trophy.Plot Summary15-year old Zits wakes up in yet another foster home. As usual... Read Flight Summary
Glass Sword by Victoria Aveyard (Harper Teen, 2016) is the second installment of the New York Times bestselling Red Queen YA fantasy series and follows a group of fugitives and rebels as they work to build an army to take on the powerful ruling class. Glass Sword follows Red Queen and is the prequel to King’s Cage. Aveyard grew up in western Massachusetts before moving to Los Angeles, California where she received her degree in... Read Glass Sword Summary
John Gardner’s 1971 novel Grendel is a retelling of the story of Beowulf, an Anglo-Saxon epic poem from the 6th century, from the perspective of the villain, the monster Grendel. In Grendel, the monster Grendel is an anti-hero, challenging the conventions of traditionally heroic behavior as he tries to understand the world in which he lives. In 1982, an animated Australian film adaptation of the novel called Grendel Grendel Grendel was released in major cities... Read Grendel Summary
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the sequel to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, is seventh installment in the record-breaking Harry Potter series and the highly-anticipated conclusion of the boy wizard’s story. Since the publication of the first Harry Potter novel in 1997, the series has sold over 500 million copies, and Harry Potter has become the best-selling fantasy series of all time. Released 10 years after the initial publication of the first Harry... Read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Summary
Heartless, first published in 2016, is a contemporary fantasy Young Adult novel by Marissa Meyer. Meyer is best known for her dystopian sci-fi YA series The Lunar Chronicles, inspired by fairy tales such as Cinderella and Snow White. Set in a fantasy world, Heartless imagines the backstory of Lewis Carroll’s iconic character the Queen of Hearts from the 1876 novel Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Heartless is also popular among the BookTok community. This guide utilizes... Read Heartless Summary
Hope Leslie, or Early Times in the Massachusetts, is a novel by Catharine Maria Sedgwick. Published as two volumes in 1827, it received critical acclaim and success. Given the time in which it was published, and the time and place it portrays (seventeenth-century New England), it is impossible to read Hope Leslie without comparing it to contemporary novels such as The Last of the Mohicans by James Fennimore Cooper. Many have argued that Sedgwick’s place... Read Hope Leslie Summary
“Hop-Frog” (originally titled “Hop Frog; Or, the Eight Chained Ourang-Outangs”) is among the last short stories by American horror and fiction author Edgar Allan Poe. First published in The Flag of Our Union in 1849, “Hop-Frog” explores themes of revenge, “madness,” and dehumanization. Poe explores similar themes in another short story published several years earlier, “The Cask of Amontillado,” a tale of betrayal and vengeance. Such thematic elements recur often in Poe’s work, given that... Read Hop-Frog Summary
Published by Minotaur Books in 2013, How the Light Gets In is the ninth book in Louise Penny’s bestselling Chief Inspector Gamache mystery series. The series is famous for its heroic protagonist, Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, the head of the homicide division at the Sûreté du Québec. The novel comprises of three narratives: the murder of Constance Ouellet, the internal conflict at the Sûreté, and the mysterious death of a clerk at the Ministry of... Read How the Light Gets In Summary
Imperium in Imperio (1899) is a historical-fiction novel by social activist Sutton E. Griggs. Imperium in Imperio explores the idea of a Black utopia, wherein Black Americans form a shadow government to seize control of the state of Texas and form their own nation. In the late-19th and early-20th centuries, the novel was sold door-to-door in Black communities and was largely unknown to the white population, ultimately garnering little notoriety upon its original publication. However... Read Imperium in Imperio Summary
Published in 2016 and winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, LaRose is a work of fiction written by author Louise Erdrich, an enrolled member of the Ojibwe people. The novel takes place on the land in and around an Ojibwe North Dakota reservation, the same physical setting as Erdrich’s previous award-winning novel The Round House. However, LaRose’s characters and time period differ from her previous book. LaRose takes place primarily during the years... Read LaRose Summary
Legend is the first book in the titular book trilogy by Chinese-American author Marie Lu. Originally published in 2011, Legend is a dystopian novel that explores topics of love, family, fascism, civil disobedience, inequality, propaganda, poverty, and hope in the face of an oppressive government. Lu was inspired by the classic Victor Hugo story Les Misérables and wanted to explore a similar cat-and-mouse dynamic in a futuristic setting. Just like the law-abiding policeman Javert pursued... Read Legend Summary
La vida es sueño, or, Life’s a Dream, by Pedro Calderón de la Barca, is one of Spain’s most well-known plays. First published and first produced in 1636, during the heyday of Spain’s golden age of literature, Life is a Dream is a play in verse that intertwines a complex family drama with a tale of honor and vengeance. The play begins with a dramatic moment, as Rossaura and her servant, Bugle, happen upon a roughly-built... Read Life Is a Dream Summary
Men of Iron is an 1891 young adult novel written and illustrated by Howard Pyle. Pyle was born in Delaware in 1853, and after years of training—beginning with a childhood passion for art—he taught illustration at Drexel University before establishing his own institute, the Howard Pyle School of Illustration Art. His style of art, which he himself was instrumental in developing, was named the Brandywine School after the mid-Atlantic region from which the artists in... Read Men of Iron Summary
Mockingjay, published in 2010 by Scholastic, is the third novel in Suzanne Collins’s bestselling Hunger Games series. The series follows the life of Katniss Everdeen, an adolescent girl living in the futuristic dystopia of Panem. Mockingjay focuses on the civil war between the 13 districts of Panem and the oppressive government of the Capitol. Through Katniss’s experiences in the war, Collins explores cycles of oppression, the meaning of love in wartime, and the power of... Read Mockingjay Summary
Murder on the Orient Express, first published in 1934, is a mystery by Agatha Christie featuring one of her most famous characters, the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot. A locked-room mystery, the novel unfolds in a train, the Orient Express, which has become stranded in a snowstorm. Poirot happens to be on the train when a man named Mr. Ratchett is murdered. Poirot is called upon to solve the case, and the book follows his investigation... Read Murder on the Orient Express Summary
Sometimes referred to as the “German Iliad,” Nibelungenlied is a 13th-century German epic poem that combines historical events with German heroic legend. The epic’s poet is unknown—though some clues within the text suggest that he was from Passau, Germany. The epic, which literally translates to “The Song of the Nibelungs” in English, portrays the Burgundians’ historic defeat by the Huns in the 5th century—the tragic result of the mythical queen Kriemhild’s desire to avenge her... Read Nibelungenlied Summary
Written in 458 BC by Greek playwright Aeschylus, The Oresteia is a trilogy of plays that includes Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, The Eumenides, as well as the lost satyr play, Proteus. The plays of The Oresteia are classic tragedies, a dramatic genre focused on the piteous and cathartic downfall of great heroes. The plays were written to be performed at the City Dionysia festival which celebrated Dionysus, god of wine and theater. The festival was... Read Oresteia Summary
Origin, by mystery/thriller author Dan Brown, is the fifth novel in the Robert Langdon series. Published in 2017, the novel extends the style, content, and subject matter established in prior books in the series. Origin deals heavily with the conflict between science and religion, as well as conservatism and liberalism in modern Spain. The novel also explores the role of technology in the evolution of humanity and what technology lends to the future. Brown is... Read Origin Summary
Presumed Innocent (1987) is Scott Turow’s first novel, originally published by Farrar Straus & Giroux. The hit novel stayed on the New York Times bestseller list for 44 weeks and is often credited as an early example of the modern legal thriller, helping to shape the genre’s conventions. Turow went on to publish 12 additional novels and three nonfiction works. He also continued to practice law, specializing in criminal defense, contrasting with Presumed Innocent’s protagonist... Read Presumed Innocent Summary
Pretty Little Liars is a young adult fiction novel written by Sara Shepard. It is the first book in the Pretty Little Liars series, which features 16 books, along with seven companion novels. The highly successful series was featured on The New York Times best-seller list and adapted into a television show in 2010. The popular show lasted seven seasons and aired on the Freeform Network. Although Shepard had only written eight books in the... Read Pretty Little Liars Summary
Prince of Thorns is the first book in the Broken Empire trilogy of fantasy novels by American-British author Mark Lawrence. It was published in 2011, followed by King of Thorns (2012) and Emperor of Thorns (2013).Plot SummaryPrince of Thorns is a bloody story of betrayal and revenge set on a postapocalyptic Earth where feudalism has returned and the boundaries between the worlds of the living and the dead are weak. The book’s protagonist, Prince Honorous... Read Prince of Thorns Summary
Red Rising begins Pierce Brown’s book series of the same name. This science fiction novel, set in a dystopia on the planet Mars, was a New York Times bestseller as well as a critical success. It was originally published in 2013; this guide refers to the 2014 Del Rey paperback edition. Brown followed Red Rising with the sequels Golden Son, Morning Star, Iron Gold, and Dark Age, respectively. Plot SummaryBrown sets Red Rising on the planet... Read Red Rising Summary
Riders of the Purple Sage is a novel by western writer Zane Grey. Set in 1871, the novel follows the story of Jane Withersteen, a Mormon woman being persecuted by her church leaders for refusing to become the third wife of church leader, Elder Tull, as well as her fondness for non-Mormons, or gentile, settlers in the area. The novel first appeared as a 19-part series in the magazine, Field and Stream, in January of... Read Riders of the Purple Sage Summary
Shadow of Night (2012) is a historical fantasy romance novel by Deborah Harkness, and the second book in the All Souls Trilogy, preceded by A Discovery of Witches (2011) and followed by The Book of Life (2014). A prequel novel, Time’s Convert (2019), follows the origin story of Matthew’s son Marcus, who is a minor character in Shadow of Night.Harkness holds a PhD from the University of California, Davis and teaches early modern European history... Read Shadow of Night Summary
Published in 2015, Leigh Bardugo’s young adult fantasy novel Six of Crows, the first in a two-part series, received starred reviews in Publishers Weekly, VOYA, and Kirkus Reviews. A fantasy heist story, the novel shifts between the alternating points of view of five teenagers who team up to pull off the ultimate prison break.Six of Crows begins in Ketterdam, an invented version of 17th-century Amsterdam, and the novel’s main characters hail from the seedy criminal... Read Six of Crows Summary
“Spunk” is a short story by Zora Neale Hurston published in 1925. Set in the rural Southern United States, “Spunk” follows the conflict that ensues when one man pursues another man’s wife. The story’s publication helped establish Hurston as a significant literary voice during the Harlem Renaissance. In 1989, George C. Wolfe adapted the story, along with content from two others by Hurston, into a play by the same name. Citations in this guide correspond... Read Spunk Summary
Steelheart, a 2013 young adult sci-fi/fantasy novel by Brandon Sanderson, is the first installment of The Reckoners trilogy. The story takes place in dystopian Chicago, dubbed “Newcago,” which is overrun by evil superhumans called Epics and ruled by a functionally invulnerable tyrant named Steelheart. David Charleston, an 18-year-old boy whose father Steelheart killed 10 years before, joins a rebel group called the Reckoners hoping that they will help him take revenge on Steelheart. Borrowing elements... Read Steelheart Summary
Stone Mattress: Nine Wicked Tales is a 2014 collection of nine short stories from Canadian author Margaret Atwood. While Atwood has published fiction, nonfiction, and poetry, she is probably best known for her dystopian novel, The Handmaid’s Tale. Other works by this author include Cat’s Eye, The Testaments, and Oryx and Crake. Atwood often tackles the power of the written word in her work. Many of the characters in Stone Mattress: Nine Wicked Tales are... Read Stone Mattress Summary
The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle (published as The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle in Canada and the United Kingdom) is Stuart Turton’s first novel. The novel was first published in 2018 by Harper Collins; this guide references the first Canadian edition. The novel is primarily a mystery, with some elements of science fiction and fantasy. The plot features elements traditionally associated with the murder mystery genre made famous by Agatha Christie, since the... Read The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle Summary
“The Battle of Maldon” is a heroic poem, also classified as an epic, dating from the 10th century. Originally written in Old English, the text details a violent battle between the Anglo-Saxon warriors and the raiding Vikings. The Anglo-Saxons are led by Earl Byrhtnoth, who held land in the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Essex and fought for his ruler, King Æthelred the Unready. The poem depicts some of the central tenets of Anglo-Saxon culture, praising loyalty... Read The Battle of Maldon Summary
The Betrothed (I Promessi Sposi), published in 1827 and revised in 1842, is a historical novel by Italian author Alessandro Manzoni. The novel follows two young lovers, Renzo and Lucia, in 1600s Lombardy; their courtship is derailed by a jealous plot to prevent their marriage, ultimately leading them to the plague-stricken city of Milan, where they face many struggles. The Betrothed is heralded as one of the most important and widely read Italian novels. This... Read The Betrothed Summary
Published in 1939, The Big Sleep by novelist and screenwriter Raymond Chandler is a murder mystery widely regarded as one of the greatest hard-boiled detective stories of the 20th century. The work introduces Philip Marlowe, a fictional private eye with a jaundiced view of humanity but a strong sense of fairness, who appears in seven other novels by Chandler. Hired by a super-rich family to negotiate with a blackmailer, Marlowe encounters murder, mayhem, and a... Read The Big Sleep Summary
The Breakdown (2017) is a psychological thriller and B. A. Paris’s follow-up to her internationally bestselling debut, Behind Closed Doors. The Breakdown was a Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Best Mystery and Thriller in 2017. It has been adapted into a film titled Blackwater Lane, released in 2024 and starring Minka Kelly, Maggie Grace, and Dermot Mulroney. The novel portrays Cass Anderson’s battle with guilt and fear after a woman is murdered near her home... Read The Breakdown Summary
The Bridegroom (2000) is a short story collection by Ha Jin. The stories touch on themes involving Chinese social life, the intersection of Chinese and American cultural and economic customs, and authority and the individual. The Bridegroom is Ha Jin’s third short story collection, and first following the success of his 1999 novel, Waiting. Each of the stories in The Bridegroom previously appeared in journals, such as Harper’s and The Boston Book Review. Plot SummaryThe... Read The Bridegroom Summary
Wendy Mass’s novel The Candymakers is a work of middle-grade fiction that follows four children competing in a national candy making competition. As the children learn more about each other and the Life is Sweet candy factory, they give up their personal ambitions for the common good: to save the factory from a businessman who desires to steal the factory’s secret chocolate ingredient. Brown Books for Young Readers published the novel in 2010.Plot SummaryThe Candymakers... Read The Candymakers Summary
“The Cask of Amontillado” is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe that was originally published in 1846. Its genre is horror. This study guide refers to the version of the story printed in the 2006 Prestwick House edition of The Best of Poe.The story begins with an unnamed narrator relaying that he has suffered great and many wrongdoings at the hands of a man named Fortunato. Though he never specifies the offenses, he does... Read The Cask of Amontillado Summary
The Castle of Otranto, first published in 1764 by English author Horace Walpole (1717-1797), is considered the first supernatural work of Gothic fiction, influencing many well-known 19th century writers such as Clara Reeve, Mary Shelley, Bram Stoker, Edgar Allan Poe, and Robert Louis Stevenson.The five-chapter long novella revolves around the mysterious supernatural events at the titular castle, whose owner goes to villainous lengths to maintain control of it. Walpole introduces Gothic elements that drive the... Read The Castle of Otranto Summary
The Count of Monte Cristo is an adventure novel by the French writer Alexandre Dumas, originally published in serial form between 1844 and 1846, which is reflected in the novel’s episodic structure, large cast of characters, and frequent shifts of scene. The novel has been translated into English several times, usually in abridged form. This guide follows the translation and abridgment by Lowell Blair, first published in 1956.Content Warning: The source material includes suicide, suicidal... Read The Count of Monte Cristo Summary
The Darkest Child (2004) is a coming-of-age historical fiction novel by Delores Phillips. The teenage protagonist and first-person narrator, Tangy Mae Quinn faces racism and segregation in the Jim Crow South, as well as domestic abuse, poverty, and nonconsensual sex work. Despite these challenges, Tangy finds eventual escape when she leaves her abusive mother, Rozelle, and her past behind her to pursue her own goals, which are rooted in education. The novel explores The Role... Read The Darkest Child Summary
The Day of the Jackal is a 1971 thriller by Frederick Forsyth. The novel is centered around a professional assassin, known only as the Jackal, who is hired by a French paramilitary group to assassinate French President Charles de Gaulle. Forsyth’s realistic, research-based writing style builds suspense through a detailed account of the cat-and-mouse chase that spans across Europe, showcasing the complexities of security and espionage during a tumultuous political era. The novel has been... Read The Day of the Jackal Summary
“The Destructors” is a frequently anthologized short story by Graham Greene (1904-1991) originally published in 1954. Greene is often regarded as one of the greatest British writers of the 20th century. His work was commercially and critically successful and was frequently adapted into films and television shows. An adaptation of “The Destructors” was included in the 1970s television series Shades of Greene. His work often reflects his Catholic values as well as his life-long battles... Read The Destructors Summary
The Duchess of Malfi, originally published as The Tragedy of the Dutchesse of Malfy, is a Jacobean revenge tragedy written by John Webster. Webster also wrote the revenge tragedy The White Devil and frequently collaborated with other playwrights working for the King’s Men in London. It was written in 1613 and performed to a private audience at Blackfriars Theatre a year later. That same year it was also performed to a general audience at the... Read The Duchess of Malfi Summary
The Firm is a legal thriller by author John Grisham. The Firm is Grisham’s second novel, and the first to bring him widespread fame as the number one novel of 1991 on the New York Times bestseller list. The novel was made into a feature film in 1993 directed by Sydney Pollack and starring Tom Cruise. In 2012, The Firm was made into a television series that enjoyed a single season on NBC that portrayed... Read The Firm Summary
The Ghost in the Tokaido Inn (1999), by Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler, is the first novel in the Samurai Detective young adult series, currently comprised of seven books. The novel follows Seikei, the son of a merchant who aspires to be a samurai, as he helps the judge investigate the theft of a ruby from a samurai lord. It explores the themes of Personal Ambition Versus Societal Expectations, The Deceptiveness of Appearances, and The Importance... Read The Ghost In The Tokaido Inn Summary
The Great Greene Heist is a middle grade novel by Varian Johnson that follows Jackson Greene, a middle school boy and nearly reformed prankster, who tries to win his crush through hijinks. The novel was named Publisher’s Best Summer Book of 2014, ALA ALSC Notable Children’s Book in 2015, and received a Kirkus Star Review. Johnson published the sequel To Catch a Cheat in 2016. Johnson is also the author of The Parker Inheritance, which... Read The Great Greene Heist Summary
Newbery Medal winner Sharon Creech’s 2012 novel, The Great Unexpected, follows the relationship between two best friends, Naomi Deane and Lizzie Scatterding, both orphans who know little about their families. They have felt heartache and loss, though these experiences impact them in contrasting ways: Lizzie is talkative and enthusiastic, while Naomi is guarded and anxious. In a discussion of her inspiration for the text, Creech recounts her realization that when faced with the unexpected, children... Read The Great Unexpected Summary
The Historian (2005), Elizabeth Kostova’s best-selling novel, blends fact and fiction to reinvent the myth of the iconic vampire Dracula, or Vlad Ţepeş. In this retelling, the unnamed narrator accompanies her ambassador father, Paul, across Europe in the early 1970s as he tells her the story of his near encounter with the vampire. He tells her the Prince of Wallachia lives, 500 years after his death. Paul’s mentor, Dr. Rossi, was conducting research on Dracula... Read The Historian Summary
J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit is a classic high fantasy adventure novel first published in 1937. Tolkien (1892-1973) was an English writer, philologist, and professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University, as well as a close friend of fellow writer C. S. Lewis. The Hobbit is the first published work recounting tales from Middle Earth, Tolkien’s fantasy world with fictional races of hobbits, elves, dwarves, and more. After fighting in World War I, Tolkien worked... Read The Hobbit Summary
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame is an 1831 gothic novel by French author Victor Hugo, originally published under the title Notre-Dame de Paris. Set in 15th-century France, the novel concerns the intertwined stories of Quasimodo, Esmeralda, and Archdeacon Claude Frollo. The story has been adapted many times for theater, television, and film, including an animated film by Disney released in 1996.This guide refers to the 2009 Oxford Classics edition of the novel, translated from French to... Read The Hunchback of Notre-Dame Summary
“The Interlopers” is one of the best-known short stories by British author Hector Hugh Munro (H. H. Munro), who wrote under the pseudonym Saki. As is typical of the author’s style, the story uses nature to question the morals and manners of humanity, especially of the more elite classes. Saki is also known for his twist endings, of which this story is a prime example. Other works by Saki include “The Open Window” and “The... Read The Interlopers Summary
The Lemonade Crime is the sequel to Jacqueline Davies’s elementary school reader novel The Lemonade War. Published in 2011, this follow-up continues the story of entrepreneurial siblings Evan and Jessie, solving the mystery of the theft that ended the first novel. The key question of the novel is about the best way to right a wrongdoing: Is it through vengeance or justice? By setting the climax of The Lemonade Crime at a mock trial organized... Read The Lemonade Crime Summary
Libation Bearers is an ancient Greek tragedy by the Athenian playwright Aeschylus, first produced in 458 BCE at the City Dionysia in Athens. Libation Bearers is the second part of the Oresteia, a trilogy exploring the themes of justice, retribution, and the cyclical pattern of bloodshed within the family of the mythical king Agamemnon. Following the events of Agamemnon, the first tragedy of Aeschylus’s Oresteia, the play depicts the murder of Clytaemestra, the queen of... Read The Libation Bearers Summary
The Lies of Locke Lamora, written by Scott Lynch and published in 2006, is the first entry in the Gentleman Bastards series. These novels mix caper stories and fantasy stories and include adventure, violence, dark humor, and intimate friendships. The Lies of Locke Lamora is an international best seller and was nominated for multiple awards. The other entries in the series are Red Seas Under Red Skies, The Republic of Thieves, and The Thorn of... Read The Lies of Locke Lamora Summary
Frank Beddor’s The Looking Glass Wars (2006) is a reimagining of Lewis Carroll’s Victorian fairy tale Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and its sequel, Alice Through the Looking-Glass (1871). The Looking Glass Wars is the first book in the middle-grade fantasy trilogy of the same name, followed by Seeing Redd (2007) and ArchEnemy (2009).The novel uses several of Carroll’s iconic figures, including Alice, the Queen of Hearts, the Mad Hatter, and the White Rabbit. Beddor... Read The Looking Glass Wars Summary
IntroductionThe Lost Symbol is a bestselling novel by Dan Brown and is the third to feature Harvard professor and symbology expert Robert Langdon. In this novel, Langdon makes a last-minute trip to Washington, DC, to give a keynote speech at an event hosted by his friend and mentor, Peter Solomon. However, when Langdon arrives, he discovers that Peter’s kidnapper lured him to Washington in order to compel him to decipher a code that will reveal... Read The Lost Symbol Summary
Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon (1930) is a detective novel that was first serialized in the magazine Black Mask. As Hammett’s third novel, The Maltese Falcon includes the introduction of Sam Spade as the protagonist, a departure from the nameless Continental Op who narrated his previous stories. Spade’s hard exterior, cool detachment, and reliance on his own moral code would become staples of the hardboiled genre, and The Maltese Falcon has since been named one... Read The Maltese Falcon Summary
Published in 2012, The Mark of Athena is the third novel in Rick Riordan’s young adult fantasy series The Heroes of Olympus, his second series in the Percy Jackson universe inspired by Greek and Roman mythologies. The Mark of Athena picks up the narrative where The Son of Neptune left off, with a Greek warship from Camp Half-Blood approaching Roman Camp Jupiter in hopes of collaborating to stop Gaea from waking up and destroying the... Read The Mark Of Athena Summary
Charles W. Chesnutt’s The Marrow of Tradition is a 1901 historical novel based on the events of an 1898 white supremacist riot in Wilmington, North Carolina. Chesnutt’s novel takes place in the fictional town of Wellington and focuses on the intertwined fates of two couples: Major and Mrs. Olivia Carteret, and Dr. William and Mrs. Janet Miller. Olivia and Janet are half sisters; while they share the same white father, Samuel Merkell, Janet’s mother was... Read The Marrow of Tradition Summary
Though The Painted Bird is set during the Holocaust, it is not strictly a Holocaust novel. The book is largely metaphorical and deals with the brutality of human nature and how the horrors we perpetrate on each other become part of us. The novel’s protagonist, a boy who is an outsider, or a “painted bird,” witnesses acts of subjugation and cruelty and seeks to understand why some people are more powerful than others. Thematically, the... Read The Painted Bird Summary
The Power of One (1989) is a Bildungsroman written by Australian author Bryce Courtenay, largely based on the life and experiences of the author who grew up on a small farm in the Lebombo Mountains in South Africa. It was the only novel published by the author for an American market. He noted that “American publishers [. . .] are interested in books [set] in their own country first and foremost,” but his novel was... Read The Power of One Summary
The Racketeer is John Grisham’s 30th book. It debuted at the top of the New York Times bestseller list in November 2012. John Grisham has twice won the Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction and also received the Library of Congress Creative Achievement Award for Fiction. He has written over 35 bestsellers. Eight of his novels have been adapted for film, and one, The Firm, spawned a 2012 television series that takes place 10 years... Read The Racketeer Summary
In The Ruins of Gorlan, a Medieval adventure-fantasy novel for middle-grade readers, young Will learns the arts of the secretive Ranger tracker-warriors and defends his kingdom against an evil baron. Released in 2004 by author John Flanagan, The Ruins of Gorlan won multiple awards, spawned the bestselling Ranger Apprentice book series, and has been published in 18 countries. A television adaptation is in the works.Following a long career in advertising, author Flanagan shifted to book... Read The Ruins of Gorlan Summary
Published in 1905, The Scarlet Pimpernel, by Baroness Emma Orczy, is a historical romance adventure novel about a wealthy English baronet with a secret life as a hero who rescues the innocent from the French Reign of Terror. Told mainly from the viewpoint of his wife, the book—based on the successful London play of the same name—birthed a series of Scarlet Pimpernel novels, movies, and TV productions. It ushered in the secret-identity genre of adventure... Read The Scarlet Pimpernel Summary
The oral tradition of myths makes collecting a complete version of “Theseus and the Minotaur,” an ancient Greek myth from the sixth century BC, a difficult task. No version contains every recorded detail about Theseus’s adventures in the Labyrinth of Crete. Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Stephen Fry’s Heroes, and many other sources contain varying levels of detail about Theseus’s heroics. This challenge increases when different translations of the text are considered, since part of the text is... Read Theseus Summary
The Sleeper and the Spindle is a standalone short story written by English American author Neil Gaiman and illustrated by Chris Riddell. It first appeared unillustrated in the 2013 anthology Rag & Bones: New Twists on Timeless Tales. The story is a loose retelling of Sleeping Beauty, featuring two unnamed female characters who act as reimagined versions of the sleeping princess and of Snow White. It uses classic fairy tale tropes and motifs to upend... Read The Sleeper and the Spindle Summary
The Spanish Tragedy, written and performed between 1587 and 1590, is an Elizabethan revenge tragedy by Thomas Kyd. The play explores the dilemmas of Hieronimo, who plots for revenge after his son Horatio is murdered. Surrounded by the intrigue and deception of the Spanish court, Hieronimo’s quest raises questions about the nature of justice and the profound impacts of grief and loss. The Spanish Tragedy was a huge hit for Kyd’s audiences, performed at least 29... Read The Spanish Tragedy Summary
The Thief and the Dogs is a 1961 surrealist, existentialist novel by Egyptian author Naguib Mahfouz. Mahfouz won the 1988 Nobel Prize for Literature and The Thief and the Dogs is considered one of his most celebrated works. The novel has been adapted for Egyptian television, and is the first novel written in Arabic to use the stream-of-consciousness style. Published nearly ten years after the Egyptian Revolution of 1952, the novel is also considered an... Read The Thief and the Dogs Summary
The Three Musketeers (1844), by French novelist and playwright Alexandre Dumas, is a novel that borrows tropes from the swashbuckling genre, historical fiction, and romance to recount the adventures of a group of king’s guard who face off against the machinations of nefarious political factions set on destabilizing the monarchy. It was first published through serialization in 1844 to great popularity. Though set in the mid-1600s, the novel connected with the philosophical underpinnings of the... Read The Three Musketeers Summary
The Tragedy of Mariam, Fair Queen of Jewry recounts actual historical events surrounding the execution of Mariam, the second wife of Herod the Great. Written by Elizabeth Cary, the Viscountess Falkland, this five-act play published in 1613 is unique in several ways—chiefly, in that it is the first English-language play authored and published by a woman. Multiple tragedies occur in the drama, which falls into the genre of a Senecan revenge tragedy. It’s also a... Read The Tragedy of Mariam Summary
The Visit, by Swiss author and playwright Friedrich Dürrenmatt, premiered in 1956 at the Schauspielhaus Zürich under the German title Der Besuch der alten Dame, or The Visit of the Old Lady. Dürrenmatt’s darkly comic satiric plays are credited with helping revitalize German theatre following World War II. His writing also reveals the influence of German playwright Bertolt Brecht, notably in Dürrenmatt’s use of parables: simple stories using human characters to illustrate a lesson or... Read The Visit Summary
“The Way Up to Heaven” by Roald Dahl was initially published in 1954 in an issue of The New Yorker magazine and later included in his 1960 short story compilation book Kiss Kiss. The story was also adapted for TV in 1957 and 1979. Dahl is well known for his children’s novels, such as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Witches, and The Big Friendly Giant, many of which appeal with elements that are unusually... Read The Way Up To Heaven Summary
First performed onstage in 1612, The White Devil is a revenge tragedy that is loosely based on the murder of Vittoria Accoramboni in Italy in 1585. The full title of the play is The White Divel; or, The Tragedy of Paulo Giordano Ursini, Duke of Bracciano. With The Life and Death of Vittoria Corombona the famous Venetian Curtizan). The play has been performed many times but has not been adapted for film. This guide refers... Read The White Devil Summary
The Winter’s Tale is a late romance play in five acts by William Shakespeare. Originally published in the First Folio of 1623 but debuted onstage circa 1611, the play follows a man’s reckless jealousy as it destroys his family and his own conscience. Shakespeare’s play is based on the romance Pandosto: The Triumph of Time by the Elizabethan author Robert Greene published in 1588, with Shakespeare taking a more lighthearted approach to Greene’s story toward... Read The Winter's Tale Summary
The Woman in Black (1983) by Susan Hill follows the gothic literary tradition. Hill explores traditional horror tropes, such as abandoned estates and ghost hauntings, set in an unspecified time in England’s countryside. The horror novella focuses on the first-person point-of-view of Arthur Kipps as he reflects on a ghost haunting he experienced as a young man. Hill explores themes of loss and mourning, the impact of holding onto the past, and the clash between... Read The Woman in Black Summary
The Word Is Murder is a murder mystery by prolific author Anthony Horowitz, published in 2017. It is the first entry in the Hawthorne & Horowitz series, which combines the detective novel with metafiction. Horowitz functions as both author and character, accompanying the fictional Daniel Hawthorne on his investigations. Their investigation blends the mystery genre with meditations on the creative process, the nature of plot, and what makes a character likable or relatable.Horowitz first achieved... Read The Word is Murder Summary
The short stories in Tadeusz Borowski’s collection, This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen, were selected from two earlier volumes of stories, Farewell to Maria and The World of Stone, both published in Poland in 1948. The collection was translated into English in 1967 and published in the United States. Borowski’s stories are based on his experiences as a concentration camp inmate at Auschwitz-Birkenau during the Holocaust. His fiancée, Maria Rundo, was arrested as... Read This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen Summary
Titus Andronicus is a tragedy generally thought to have been written between 1588 and 1593 and is usually credited to William Shakespeare. The play is set in an undefined time in imperial Rome. Roman General Titus Andronicus returns victorious from a long war. Tamora, Queen of the Goths, is his prisoner, along with her family and retinue. He authorizes the execution of one of her sons by his sons. This begins a vicious cycle of... Read Titus Andronicus Summary
Train to Pakistan is a 1956 historical novel by Indian novelist Khushwant Singh. Set during the 1947 partition of India that created the nations of Pakistan and India, it focuses on the way partition impacted the people on the ground. Focusing on the lives of ordinary citizens as they were torn from their homes, Train to Pakistan brings a human dimension to one of the bloodiest periods in the history of the two countries. Before the... Read Train to Pakistan Summary
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea is a science fiction adventure novel by French author Jules Verne. It was originally published in serialized form in 1869 under the title Vingt mille lieues sous les mers, and later as a book in 1870. In 1873, the first English-language translation was released. The book was highly acclaimed at the time of its publication and was one of several successful novels by Verne. Others include Journey to the... Read Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea Summary
