Jane Eyre - by Charlotte Brontë

I think I have read this three times, but only once as an adult.  Jane Eyre (UK edition) (Deutsch Edition) has a reputation as a woman's book, possibly because so many adolescent girls read and love this classic. 

Those men who do read the book are probably dutifully reading their way through the Brontë sisters. I hope not, but suspect it is the case!

This is a strange, dark, romantic book with a strange, dark romantic hero.  (A familiar Brontë theme.) The book has some interesting  plot twists and is not slow moving in that sense.  But time moves very slowly for Jane and Rochester.  I don't know if this is a book for everyone, but I think you will know from the first chapter if you are going to like it or not.  The beginning about Jane's childhood has always reminded me of Dicken's darker descriptions of childhood and is very affecting.

'You ought to be aware, Miss, that you are under obligations to Mrs. Reed: she keeps you: if she were to turn you off, you would have to go to the poorhouse."

I had nothing to say to these words: they were not new to me: my very first recollections of existence included hints of the same kind. This reproach of my dependence had become a vague sing-song in my ear: very painful and crushing, but only half intelligible. Miss Abbot joined in -


"And you ought not to think yourself on an equality with the Misses Reed and Master Reed, because Missis kindly allows you to be brought up with them. They will have a great deal of money, and you will have none: it is your place to be humble, and to try to make yourself agreeable to them."'

 It is a good book, give it a chance fellas!  And women, enjoy it again!

This blog is a guide to the best free and inexpensive classic literature for the US & UK Kindle. If you enjoy my suggestions, please tell your friends who read to give my blog a try. 

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For a nominal fee of 99 cents/pence, you can subscribe to this blog and have it automatically download on your Kindle. This gives you the convenience of being able to download the books directly to your Kindle, instead of downloading them to your computer and then transferring them to your Kindle. It also helps support my blog.

UK readers may go to this Amazon link to subscribe.  (Slightly more than half my readers are from the UK)

US readers may go to this Amazon link

Thank to all my readers, whether you subscribe on your Kindle or whether you read it online.  I love to get good reviews!  Who wouldn't?  Should you care to leave a review, follow these links for UK readers or US readers.

Swann's Way - by Marcel Proust

Awhile back I blogged on Remembrance of Things Past.  There were some problems with Amazon's listing of Proust's books.  For example, the new Lydia Davis translation for Penguin was not identified on Amazon US, although I did locate the book.  She has now been correctly credited and they put up the correct book cover.  The price is outrageous and as Amazon has been doing on Amazon UK with prices over a certain amount,there is a notation that the publisher set the price.

I also took Amazon US to task for not listing Volume 1: Swann's Way of the Kilmartin\Enright\Moncrief translation. (The series is titled In Search of Lost Time.)  It is now on Amazon US.  So although this is not a free or inexpensive edition, I wanted to call it to your attention.  If you are re-reading Proust, you may well want to read this translation. 

The paperback set of the whole series is about $60.00, not much more than the set for Kindle!  Of course I prefer the Kindle "volumes," but I think they should be far less than the paperback versions.

I corrected these errors by using the links in the FEEDBACK dialog box that is near the bottom of every page on Amazon.  It is nice to know they listen!

So I am sorry not to be listing the free books here, for US or UK, but you can find them on the original blog I did on Proust.

Here is a little taste, not of Proust's petites madeleines, but his humor and his sentence construction!

"In the next room I could hear my aunt talking quietly to herself. She never spoke save in low tones, because she believed that there was something broken in her head and floating loose there, which she might displace by talking too loud; but she never remained for long, even when alone, without saying something, because she believed that it was good for her throat, and that by keeping the blood there in circulation it would make less frequent the chokings and other pains to which she was liable; besides, in the life of complete inertia which she led she attached to the least of her sensations an extraordinary importance, endowed them with a Protean ubiquity which made it difficult for her to keep them secret, and, failing a confidant to whom she might communicate them, she used to promulgate them to herself in an unceasing monologue which was her sole form of activity."

 

This blog is a guide to the best free and inexpensive classic literature for the US & UK Kindle. If you enjoy my suggestions, please tell your friends who read to give my blog a try. 

Join me on Twitter, FaceBook, or Pinterest.

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For a nominal fee of 99 cents/pence, you can subscribe to this blog and have it automatically download on your Kindle. This gives you the convenience of being able to download the books directly to your Kindle, instead of downloading them to your computer and then transferring them to your Kindle. It also helps support my blog.

UK readers may go to this Amazon link to subscribe.  (Slightly more than half my readers are from the UK)

US readers may go to this Amazon link

Thank to all my readers, whether you subscribe on your Kindle or whether you read it online.  I love to get good reviews!  Who wouldn't?  Should you care to leave a review, follow these links for UK readers or US readers.

Emily Dickinson, Three Series, Complete

We see them whenever our Kindle goes to sleep:

Harriet Beecher Stowe

Emily Dickinson

Samuel Clemens

John Steinbeck

Sir Thomas More

Charlotte Brontë

Agatha Christie

Alexandre Dumas

Virginian Woolf

Jules Verne

Jane Austen

Ralph Ellison

It would be fitting if they all had free Kindle books, but they do not.  However many do, and they will be featured in my blog from time to time.  And here is Emily Dickinson from Emily Dickinson, Three Series, Complete. (UK & DE readers, your link is at the end.)

            A precious -- mouldering pleasure -- 'tis --
            To meet an Antique Book --
            In just the Dress his Century wore --
            A privilege -- I think --

            His venerable Hand to take --
            And warming in our own --
            A passage back -- or two -- to make --
            To Times when he -- was young --

            His quaint opinions -- to inspect --
            His thought to ascertain
            On Themes concern our mutual mind --
            The Literature of Man --

            What interested Scholars -- most --
            What Competitions ran --
            When Plato -- was a Certainty --
            And Sophocles -- a Man --

            When Sappho -- was a living Girl --
            And Beatrice wore
            The Gown that Dante -- deified --
            Facts Centuries before

            He traverses -- familiar --
            As One should come to Town --
            And tell you all your Dreams -- were true --
            He lived -- where Dreams were born --

            His presence is Enchantment --
            You beg him not to go --
            Old Volume shake their Vellum Heads
            And tantalize -- just so --
I know my readers will appreciate my choice of poem! Here is where this blog is needed. The above is from Emily Dickinson, Three Series, Complete which is free.  Also free is Poems by Emily Dickinson, Third Series, but it is a third of the size and the poetry is not formatted.  Free and not worth it!

£0.69 UK edition:  Poems: Three Complete Series is not the same as the US edition, but the poems in the index are linked and this is a Mobi edition and they are all very good.   (EUR 0,99 DE edition is also published by Mobi)

This blog is a guide to the best free and inexpensive classic literature for the US & UK Kindle. If you enjoy my suggestions, please tell your friends who read to give my blog a try. 

Join me on Twitter, FaceBook, or Pinterest.

-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~

For a nominal fee of 99 cents/pence, you can subscribe to this blog and have it automatically download on your Kindle. This gives you the convenience of being able to download the books directly to your Kindle, instead of downloading them to your computer and then transferring them to your Kindle. It also helps support my blog.

UK readers may go to this Amazon link to subscribe.  (Slightly more than half my readers are from the UK)

US readers may go to this Amazon link

Thank to all my readers, whether you subscribe on your Kindle or whether you read it online.  I love to get good reviews!  Who wouldn't?  Should you care to leave a review, follow these links for UK readers or US readers.

The Scarlet Pimpernel - by Baroness Emmuska Orczy

Those Frenchies seek him everywhere.

Is he in heaven?—Is he in hell?

That demmed, elusive Pimpernel."

This ditty is by everyone's favorite fop, Sir Percy Blakeney.

If you enjoy a cracking good read and can immerse yourself in the bloody French Revolution without having nightmares of the guillotine- read The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Emmuska Orczy. (NOT AVAILABLE -UK edition) (NOT AVAILABLE -Deutsch edition)

An author with such a colorful name must be a colorful writer and you will not be disappointed.  The excellent movie with Leslie Howard is mostly forgotten and probably the eponymous character's name is better known than his story.   Here is your chance to cheat death with the Pimpernel and it won't cost you a penny! Sir Percy Blakeney is also thrown in for free . . .

"I saw the Scarlet Pimpernel alone, for a few moments in Calais," said Sir Andrew, "a day or two ago. He crossed over to England two days before we did. He had escorted the party all the way from Paris, dressed--you'll never credit it!--as an old market woman, and driving--until they were safely out of the city--the covered cart, under which the Comtesse de Tournay, Mlle. Suzanne, and the Vicomte lay concealed among the turnips and cabbages. They, themselves, of course, never suspected who their driver was. He drove them right through a line of soldiery and a yelling mob, who were screaming, `A bas les aristos!' But the market cart got through along with some others, and the Scarlet Pimpernel, in shawl, petticoat and hood, yelled `A bas les aristos!' louder than anybody. Faith!" added the young man, as his eyes glowed with enthusiasm for the beloved leader, "that man's a marvel! His cheek is preposterous, I vow!--and that's what carries him through."

This blog is a guide to the best free and inexpensive classic literature for the US & UK Kindle. If you enjoy my suggestions, please tell your friends who read to give my blog a try. 

Join me on Twitter, FaceBook, or Pinterest.

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For a nominal fee of 99 cents/pence, you can subscribe to this blog and have it automatically download on your Kindle. This gives you the convenience of being able to download the books directly to your Kindle, instead of downloading them to your computer and then transferring them to your Kindle. It also helps support my blog.

UK readers may go to this Amazon link to subscribe.  (Slightly more than half my readers are from the UK)

US readers may go to this Amazon link

Thank to all my readers, whether you subscribe on your Kindle or whether you read it online.  I love to get good reviews!  Who wouldn't?  Should you care to leave a review, follow these links for UK readers or US readers.

The Miracle Mongers - An Expose by Harry Houdini

Perhaps you did not know that Harry Houdini was an author.  He wrote because he was a skeptic of spiritualism and driven to ghost-busting and writing about the frauds he found.

Opening The Miracle Mongers (£1.58 UK edition) (EUR 1,78 Deutsch edition) entirely at random, I found the following compelling passage:

MANY of our most noted magicians have considered it not beneath their dignity to introduce fire-eating into their programmes, either in their own work or by the employment of a "Fire Artist." Although seldom presenting it in his recent performances, Ching Ling Foo is a fire-eater of the highest type, refining the effect with the same subtle artistry that marks all the work of this super-magician.

   Of Foo's thousand imitators the only positively successful one was William E. Robinson, whose tragic death while in the performance of the bullet-catching trick is the latest addition to the long list of casualties chargeable to that ill-omened juggle. He carried the imitation even as far as the name, calling himself Chung Ling Soo. Robinson was very successful in the classic trick of apparently eating large quantities of cotton and blowing smoke and sparks from the mouth. His teeth were finally quite destroyed by the continued performance of this trick, the method of which may be found in Chapter Six.

Wow, who knew that fire-eating could be of the highest type or not?  I might have guessed that bullet catching carried an ill omen though  . . .

The full title of this work is MIRACLE MONGERS AND THEIR METHODS: A COMPLETE EXPOSÉ OF THE MODUS OPERANDI OF FIRE EATERS, HEAT RESISTERS, POISON EATERS, VENOMOUS REPTILE DEFIERS, SWORD SWALLOWERS, HUMAN OSTRICHES, STRONG MEN, ETC. 

There will always be magicians and those who are amazed by them.  Here is your chance to sit and learn from the greatest of them. 

This blog is a guide to the best free and inexpensive classic literature for the US & UK Kindle. If you enjoy my suggestions, please tell your friends who read to give my blog a try. 

Join me on Twitter, FaceBook, or Pinterest.

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For a nominal fee of 99 cents/pence, you can subscribe to this blog and have it automatically download on your Kindle. This gives you the convenience of being able to download the books directly to your Kindle, instead of downloading them to your computer and then transferring them to your Kindle. It also helps support my blog.

UK readers may go to this Amazon link to subscribe.  (Slightly more than half my readers are from the UK)

US readers may go to this Amazon link

Thank to all my readers, whether you subscribe on your Kindle or whether you read it online.  I love to get good reviews!  Who wouldn't?  Should you care to leave a review, follow these links for UK readers or US readers.

The Glory of the Trenches - by Coningsby Dawson

I have read a number of memoirs of the first world war and visited the battlefields.  If you share this interest, you will be interested in the oddly titled The Glory of the Trenches. (Only available for the US Kindle.)

Here is a sample:

    'The adjutant glanced coldly at the prisoner. "What have you to say
    for yourself?"

    The man was ghastly white and shaking like an aspen. "Sir, I'm not the
    man I was since I saw my best friend, Jimmie, with his head blown off
    and lying in his hands. It's kind of got me. I can't face up to it."

    The adjutant was silent for a few seconds; then he said, "You know you
    have a double choice. You can either be shot up there, doing your
    duty, or behind the lines as a coward. It's for you to choose. I don't
    care."'

I have not read this memoir, but it does not look bad and that passage is harrowing.  Most of the memoirs that have not come to historian's attention by now are flawed in some way.  I have seen a number that are not readable.  Usually because they are too sentimental or are in some way not appealing to our sensibilities.  This memoir is not in that category.  It may be an undiscovered treasure.  Read it and find out!

How sad that it was not the War to End All Wars. . . .

This blog is a guide to the best free and inexpensive classic literature for the US & UK Kindle. If you enjoy my suggestions, please tell your friends who read to give my blog a try. 

Join me on Twitter, FaceBook, or Pinterest.

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For a nominal fee of 99 cents/pence, you can subscribe to this blog and have it automatically download on your Kindle. This gives you the convenience of being able to download the books directly to your Kindle, instead of downloading them to your computer and then transferring them to your Kindle. It also helps support my blog.

UK readers may go to this Amazon link to subscribe.  (Slightly more than half my readers are from the UK)

US readers may go to this Amazon link

Thank to all my readers, whether you subscribe on your Kindle or whether you read it online.  I love to get good reviews!  Who wouldn't?  Should you care to leave a review, follow these links for UK readers or US readers.