Early World Literature

The year is 1902, and the world is changing with the new century. Twenty-one-year-old Ava Stanley, the daughter of two celebrated Arcane Taxonomists, has much to live up to—however scarce her magical abilities may be. While her parents draw power from spectacular birds and megafauna, Ava’s connection to the natural world is much smaller, stemming from the microscopic. This is useful in her quest to become a doctor, as she studies the burgeoning links between bacteria and disease, but it means Ava’s power itself is also smaller.

The Montoyas are used to a life without explanations. They know better than to ask why the pantry never seems to run low, or why their matriarch won’t ever leave their home in Four Rivers - not for graduations, weddings, or baptisms. But when Orquídea Divina invites them to her funeral and to collect their inheritance, they hope to learn the secrets that she has held onto so tightly their whole lives. Instead, Orquídea is transformed into a ceiba tree, leaving them with more questions than answers.

Does time heal all wounds? Or do some last forever? Pennsylvania, 1971: Graham Davidson is a young man with survivor’s guilt after the death of three siblings. Estranged from his father and seeking a direction in his life, Graham learns about vision quests from a Crow Indian. He secures seasonal employment in Yellowstone National Park and embarks on a spiritual journey. Wyoming Territory, 1871: Under a full moon at a sacred thermal area, Graham finds himself in Yellowstone a century earlier - one year before it was established as a national park.

The gravy train hasn’t stopped in the hollers of western Virginia for more than 30 years when Stony Shelor starts his junior year at Jubal Early High. Class divides and racism are still the hardened norms as the Eisenhower years draw to a close. Violence lies coiled under the calm surface, ready to strike at any time.

In a small village in Italy at the turn of the 20th century, Jane chafes at stifling routine and tradition. So when an opportunity presents itself to immigrate to America, her hunger for escape compels her to leave everything behind. Far away, in Henry Ford's factories in Michigan, a new kind of life is taking shape, and it offers gleaming promise for Jane and her young husband.

Mecklenburgh Square has always been a radical address. Nestled in the heart of Bloomsbury, these townhouses have borne witness to the lives of some of the century's most revolutionary cultural figures - many of whom were extraordinary women. United by their desire to experiment with new ways of living - and, therefore, of being - these authors and thinkers were trailblazers in their commitment to creative independence.

Growing up on a farm in early twentieth-century rural Iceland, Karitas Ólafsdóttir, one of six siblings, yearns for a new life. An artist, Karitas has a powerful calling and is determined to never let go of her true being, one unsuited for the conventional. But she is powerless against the fateful turns of real life and all its expectations of women. Pulled back time and again by design and by chance to the Icelandic countryside - as dutiful daughter, loving mother, and fisherman’s wife - she struggles to thrive, to be what she was meant to be.

In 1918, Winkler explodes from a community of 13 helpful souls to a crowded coal mining town of strangers with divided loyalties. War in faraway Europe means more money in the pockets of May Rose and her friends, but as a new wife and mother she feels cut off from people and community events. And though mine owners like her husband are making money hand over fist, the workers' poverty and resentment threaten trouble when the war ends.

Special delivery: Danger! When Stanley's mother needs the secret ingredient for a special recipe, Stanley mails himself to Mexico to track down its mysterious maker. But when a band of spies threatens to steal the secret, Stanley's simple trip becomes a race against an opponent that even a flat boy like himself can't slip past!!

Stanley's not the only flat one! When a flat skull is discovered in Africa, Stanley Lambchop decides to travel there with his brother, Arthur, and their father, George. Maybe studying the skull will give them clues to Stanley's flatness. But once in Africa, the Lambchops are in for more adventure than they bargained for. From lions to zebras to elephants, it's the safari of a lifetime!

Coming of age can happen at the strangest times. For Anders Hill, long ensconced in "the land of steady habits" - the affluent hamlets of Connecticut that dot the commuter rail line - it's finally time to reap the rewards of a sensible life. Into his 60s and newly retired, his grown sons' college tuitions paid in full, Anders finds the contentment he's been promised is still just out of reach. So he decides he's had enough of steady habits: he leaves his wife, buys a condo, and waits for freedom to transform him.

Clap your hands and sing along to this fresh take on a traditional singalong. The multicultural children in this colorful early learner encourage action and imagination, and two full spreads at the end teach "hello" in 36 languages, and the names of the children and their countries of origin.

Flat Stanley goes north! Stanley Lambchop and his family are in British Columbia, Canada, for some skiing and winter fun. But when Stanley and his new friend Nick go snowboarding - with Stanley as the snowboard, of course - they take a midair tumble just as the wind picks up...and find themselves floating in an amazing Canadian cross-country journey that might just be Stanley's wildest adventure yet!

A Flat Ninja? Stanley and his brother, Arthur, are such huge fans of the movie star ninja Oda Nobu that they decide to send him something even better than fan mail - Stanley himself! Soon enough, Flat Stanley is in Japan, seeing the country with his idol. But when trouble surprises them, it will take a real hero to save the day.

William Wordsworth is one of the greatest poets of English literature. This poem, Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood, is often considered as one of Wordsworth's greatest masterpieces. Here, he explores some of the themes that always inspired him, namely his childhood, memories, the beauties of nature, and the human soul. In this audiobook, the poem has been analyzed with a brief annotation with relevant quotations from the original text. The main poem has also been narrated.

Ancient pyramids can be flat-out dangerous! Ever since Stanley was flattened by a bulletin board, there are places he can get to that no one else can. So when Stanley receives a letter from an archaeologist, he travels by airmail to Egypt to help find an ancient treasure deep in the heart of a great pyramid. But what if even the flattest boy on earth can't wriggle out of this dark tomb - and the terrible mess he finds himself in?

Ted Hughes wrote a series of stories for children from the early 1960s through until 1995 about how the world, and the creatures in it, came into being. Meet the Polar Bear whose obsession with her snowy white fur is so great that she can live only in a landscape surrounded by her own reflection; the Whale, growing in God's garden beside the carrots; King Leo, who began life because God was hungry for his sausages; poor Parrot's painful defeat in the marriage song contest at the wedding of Man and Woman; and Sparrow's heroic battle against the bird-swallowing Black Hole.

Warrior-prince Rama is about to be crowned Young King, when he hears the devastating news that his father, king of Ayodhya, has been tricked into banishing him to the forest. His devoted wife, Sita, insists on accompanying him in exile, but the evil 10-headed Lord Ravana has fallen deeply in love with the beautiful princess and steals her away. Aided by Hanuman, mighty captain of the monkeys, Rama sets out across the world to find her and destroy Ravana in a deadly battle.

Through vivid storytelling, Early Bloomers explores the challenges and triumphs faced by high schoolers as they navigated the complexities of love, sexual awakening, identity, and self-discovery in this era of openness and cultural fusion. This novella holds high literary value in shedding light on a rarely explored group of individuals, and it also holds immense social and economic significance as some of them will play a major role in shaping the next generation as leaders.

The late 16th-century penal debt bond, which allowed an unsatisfied creditor to seize the body of his debtor, set in motion a series of precedents that would shape the legal, philosophical, and moral issue of property-in-person in England and America for centuries. Focusing on this historical juncture at which debt litigation was not merely an aspect of society but seemed to engulf it completely, Of Bondage examines a culture that understood money and the body of the borrower as comparable forms of property that impinged on one another at the moment of default.