Klasika

Audiobook The White Guard written by Mikhail Bulgakov. In the Ukrainian capital Kiev (‘the City’), life has become frightening and fragile. Bulgakov’s first full-length novel is set in the harsh and chaotic winter of 1918–19, as power struggles start to play out with brutal consequences. Echoing Tolstoy’s approach in War and Peace, Bulgakov contrasts the concerns of domestic life with the wide-ranging and destructive historical events; but where Tolstoy’s structure is clear, Bulgakov interweaves narrative, details of military action, snatches of songs, dreams, dialogue and fragments of thought to capture this swirl of confusion on every level, as those caught in the middle of circumstances beyond their control try to ground themselves.

Jocelyn Pierston, a successful sculptor, is helpless in the face of ‘the well-beloved’: the manifestation of perfect womanhood that seems to move like a will-o’-the-wisp from one acquaintance to the next. It shapes his whole life. Where his artistry involves permanence – cold stone objects – his heart is caught by ephemeral beauty.

One abandoned, one unfinished, these short works show Austen equally at home with romance (a widowed clergyman with four daughters must needs be in search of a husband or two in The Watsons) and with social change (a new, commercial seaside resort in Sanditon). Typically touching, funny, charming and sharp.

The Water Babies, A Fairy Tale for a Land Baby is a children's novel by the Reverend Charles Kingsley. Written in 1862-1863 as a serial for Macmillan's Magazine, it was first published in its entirety in 1863. The book was extremely popular in England during its day, and was a mainstay of British children's literature for many decades.

"The Warden" is the first novel in "The Chronicles of Barsetshire" series and was also Trollope’s first breakthrough novel. It is the story of a devoted priest, beloved by all who know him, and who is racked by fear that he is accepting money to which he is not entitled. His antagonist is his prospective son-in-law John Bol, whilst his (somewhat unwelcome) ally is the characterful Archdeacon of Barchester, Dr.

The Voyage Out is the first novel by Virginia Woolf, published in 1915 by Duckworth; and published in the U. S. in 1920 by Doran. Rachel Vinrace embarks for South America on her father's ship and is launched on a course of self discovery in a kind of modern mythical voyage. The mismatched jumble of passengers provide Woolf with an opportunity to satirize Edwardian life.

Between the eighth and eleventh centuries Vikings stormed out of their Scandinavian homelands to raid and loot along the coasts of Europe. In old Norse to ‘go a’viking’ meant to take to sea in a long ship for an adventure. Sometimes this was a trading trip, sometimes a piratical raid. Often it was both.

First published in 1766, the loveable and innocent Dr Primrose and his family have given pleasure to all that have read it. The story opens with the vicar losing his fortune and moving to another parish. What follows is a tale of love, deceit, betrayal, humour and a hidden hero. It was one of Charles Dickens favourite books and a source of inspiration to him.

Three trees, known as the Peacock trees, are blamed by the peasants for the fever that has killed many. Squire Vane scoffs at this legend as superstition. To prove them wrong, once and for all, he takes a bet to spend the night in the trees. In the morning he has vanished. Is he dead, and if so who has killed him? The poet? The lawyer? The woodsman? The trees?.

Pressured into a political career by his traditional, establishmentarian family, Nick Dormer longs to be a painter. Eventually, encouraged by the carefree aesthete Gabriel Nash, reminiscent of Oscar Wilde, he resigns from Parliament and follows his artistic dream. His journey is counterpointed with that of budding young actress Miriam Rooth, the subject of Nick’s most successful paintings and the ‘tragic muse’ of the title, who too sacrifices an affluent life (marriage with Nick’s cousin Peter) for her art.