Chartwell Deluxe Editions | Park County Library System

1) Alice's adventures in Wonderland ; and, Through the looking-glass

Author

Earliest Publication Date

1930

Summary

When Alice follows a strange rabbit down a rabbit hole and passes through a looking glass, she experiences curious sensations and encounters the Mad Hatter, the fiendish Queen of Hearts, and many other odd characters.

2) Anne of Green Gables

Author

Montgomery, L. M. (Lucy Maud), 1874-1942

Earliest Publication Date

1908

Summary

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"Anne of Green Gables' tells the tale of a little red headed orphaned girl, mistakenly sent to the Cuthbert's' farm on Prince Edward Island. Anne's strong character and vivid imagination both help and hinder her as she makes her way through childhood in the pretty little town of Avonlea. This early work by Lucy Maud Montgomery was originally published in 1908 and we are now republishing it with a brand new introductory biography. Lucy Maud Montgomery...

3) Dracula

Author

Stoker, Bram, 1847-1912

Earliest Publication Date

1897

Summary

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First published in 1897, Dracula by Bram Stoker has become the standard against which all other vampire stories are compare and the inspiration for countless film and stage adaptations. Indeed, the name "Dracula" has been synonymous with the Undead for at least a century, and the original novels till has the power to chill. Come then to Castle Dracula, hidden in the forbidding peaks of the Carpathian Mountains, where an undying creature of evil casts...

4) Emma

Author

Austen, Jane, 1775-1817

Earliest Publication Date

1948

Summary

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"The culmination of Jane Austen's genius, a sparkling comedy of love and marriage--now in a stunning 200th-anniversary Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition Beautiful, clever, rich--and single--Emma Woodhouse is perfectly content with her life and sees no need for either love or marriage. Nothing, however, delights her more than interfering in the romantic lives of others. But when she ignores the warnings of her good friend Mr. Knightley and attempts to...

5) Frankenstein

Author

Shelley, Mary

Earliest Publication Date

1994

Summary

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Mary Shelley began writing Frankenstein when she was only eighteen. At once a Gothic thriller, a passionate romance, and a cautionary tale about the dangers of science, Frankenstein tells the story of committed science student Victor Frankenstein. Obsessed with discovering the cause of generation and life and bestowing animation upon lifeless matter, Frankenstein assembles a human being from stolen body parts but; upon bringing it to life, he recoils...

6) Jane Eyre

Author

Bronte, Charlotte

Earliest Publication Date

2011

Summary

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Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë is a powerful exploration of identity, autonomy, and moral integrity within a rigid Victorian society. The novel follows the life of Jane, an orphaned girl who rises from hardship to become a governess at Thornfield Hall, where she falls in love with the enigmatic Mr. Rochester. Through trials of love, betrayal, and self-discovery, Jane navigates her path with resilience and unwavering principles, seeking a balance between...

7) Little women

Author

Alcott, Louisa May, 1832-1888

Earliest Publication Date

1915

Summary

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For generations, children around the world have come of age with Louisa May Alcott's March girls: hardworking eldest sister Meg, headstrong, impulsive Jo, timid Beth, and precocious Amy. With their father away at war, and their loving mother Marmee working to support the family, the four sisters have to rely on one another for support as they endure the hardships of wartime and poverty. We witness the sisters growing up and figuring out what role...

8) Moby Dick

Author

Melville, Herman, 1819-1891

Earliest Publication Date

1926

Summary

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?Call me Ishmael? is the iconic opening line of Herman Melville?s classic American novel, Moby-Dick. Ishmael is a seaman aboard the whaling vessel, Pequod, under the vengeful captain, Ahab. Maniacally seeking retribution from the great white sperm whale called Moby-Dick--the whale responsible for the captain?s missing leg--Ahab leads the crew on a quest to kill the infamous beast.

9) Pride and prejudice

Author

Austen, Jane, 1775-1817

Earliest Publication Date

1917

Summary

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When Elizabeth Bennet meets Fitzwilliam Darcy for the first time at a ball, she writes him off as an arrogant and obnoxious man. He not only acts like an insufferable snob, but she also overhears him rejecting the very idea of asking her for a dance! As life pits them against each other again and again, Darcy begins to fall for Elizabeth's wit and intelligence and Elizabeth begins to question her feelings about Darcy. But when Darcy saves her youngest...

10) Sense and sensibility

Author

Austen, Jane, 1775-1817

Earliest Publication Date

1896

Summary

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Jane Austen's first published novel, sparkling with wit and artistry, captures the inequities of birth, class, and marriage faced by the sisters Dashwood. Published in 1811, Sense and Sensibility has delighted generations of readers with its masterfully crafted portrait of two sisters, Elinor and Marianne Dashwood. Forced to leave their home after their father's death, Elinor and Marianne must rely on making good marriages as their means of support....

11) The adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Author

Twain, Mark, 1835-1910

Earliest Publication Date

1931

Summary

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Fresh from his escapades with Tom Sawyer, with six thousand dollars in the bank and the Widow Douglas as his guardian, Huck Finn faces a new challenge: his father, Pap, who is so determined to get his hands on Huck's fortune that he kidnaps Huck and threatens to kill him. Escaping from Pap, Huck meets the runaway slave, Jim, who plans to head north and buy his wife and children our of slavery. Huck joins Jim on a salvaged raft, and together the two...

12) The Count of Monte Cristo

Author

Dumas, Alexandre, 1802-1870

Earliest Publication Date

1894

Summary

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"Set against the tumultuous years of the post Napoleonic era, Dumas's grand historical romance recounts the swashbuckling adventures of Edmond Dantès, a dashing young sailor falsely accused of treason"--Jacket.

13) The great Gatsby

Author

Fitzgerald, F. Scott (Francis Scott), 1896-1940

Earliest Publication Date

1925

Summary

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"In a single, engaging volume, The Great Gatsby presents a helpful literary guide to one of America's most prized classic novels. First published in 1925, F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby captured the spirit of the Jazz Age and examined the American obsession with love, wealth, material objects, and class. Considered one of the great novels of the 20th century, Fitzgerald s famous work remains relevant for its observations on the pursuit of...

14) The Iliad

Author

Homer

Earliest Publication Date

1924

Summary

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When Emily Wilson's translation of The Odyssey appeared in 2017--revealing the ancient poem in a contemporary idiom that was "fresh, unpretentious and lean" (Madeline Miller, Washington Post)--critics lauded it as "a revelation" (Susan Chira, New York Times) and "a cultural landmark" (Charlotte Higgins, Guardian) that would forever change how Homer is read in English. Now Wilson has returned with an equally revelatory translation of Homer's other...

15) The Inferno

Author

Alighieri, Dante

Earliest Publication Date

2004

Summary

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In 1867, when Henry Wadsworth Longfellow published the first American edition of The Inferno, Dante was almost unknown in this country. The New England poet and educator, who taught Italian literature at Harvard, introduced Dante's literary genius to the New World with this vibrant blank verse translation of the first and most popular book of the three-part Divine Comedy. Expressed in haunting poetry of great emotional power, The Inferno chronicles...

16) The legend of Sleepy Hollow: and other stories

Author

Irving, Washington, 1783-1859

Earliest Publication Date

1976

Summary

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Collection of four stories of strange and unexplainable circumstances. A headless horseman haunts Sleep Hollow. At least that's the legend in the tiny village of Tarrytown. But scary stories won't stop the town's new schoolmaster, Ichabod Crane, from crossing through the Hollow, especially when the beautiful Katrina lives on the other side. Will Ichabod win over his beloved or discover that the legend of Sleepy Hollow is actually true? Also, Rip Van...

17) The phantom of the Opera

Author

Leroux, Gaston, 1868-1927

Earliest Publication Date

1976

Summary

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Gaston Leroux's novel The Phantom of the Opera, first published in 1910, remained a perennial favorite throughout the twentieth century and into the early 2000s. It was adapted to several popular motion pictures and into one of the most successful stage musicals of all time. Its main character, Erik, is a romantic figure whose appeal reaches across different cultures and times. He is a sensitive soul, an accomplished composer and musician whose great...

18) The Republic

Author

Plato

Earliest Publication Date

1901

Summary

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"The Republic is Plato's masterwork. It was written 2,400 years ago and remains one of the most widely read books in the world, famous for both the richness of its ideas and the virtuosity of its writing. Presented as a dialogue between Plato's teacher Socrates and various interlocutors, it is an exhortation to study philosophy, inviting its readers to reflect on the choices we must make if we are to live the best life available to us. This complex,...

19) The strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Author

Stevenson, Robert Louis, 1850-1894

Earliest Publication Date

1946

Summary

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"This eerily superb story of murder and monstrosity on the streets of Victorian London has remained in the public imagination for well over a century. Robert Louis Stevenson's classic story of split personalities lurking beneath the prim and proper morals of society is now available in an unabridged, super readable format for all readers."-- Back cover.