This story of obsession and loss is set in the thespian world. When a figure from the past comes back to retrieve something he lost, a pair of lovers are thrown into turmoil. The strange and powerful person has a story to tell.but what will the ending be?

Set in the gold and quartz-mining community, this queer and amusing little vignette explains why Dick Baker's cat, who always had such a propensity for finding the premium gold-panning plots, takes strongly against quartz mining and never is to be swayed otherwise. A sweet, funny and well-written short, that showcases Twain's wit and skill brillian...

Our narrator tells the sad tale of her marriage, marred by a husband who breaks her heart spending his money in disreputable establishments, while she, Barbara, slowly withers away. Her beauty fading, she moves inevitably closer towards her only form of escape, her death. A melancholy and tragic tale, masterfully told.

Dr Heidigger's Experiment is a short story by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne, about a scientist who claims to have been sent water from the Fountain of Youth. He calls together his old friends and invites them to taste the waters. The tale explores the transience of youth, and the desires that many have but few acknowledge.

This ghostly story by O.Henry tells the tale of Danny, on his first day away from home, in the 'Big City'. Looking around his new apartment, he begins to discover hints of who the previous occupant could have been. This story about beauty, warmth, loneliness and regret will touch the heart of any who read it.

Bingo Little, friend of butler Jeeves' master Bertie Wooster and a member of the Drones Club, is also a hopeless romantic. Our heroes Jeeves and Wooster often try to help him into or out of romantic entanglements but to little avail, or at least they often make matters worse! Sublime comedy from the master of humor.

Richard "Bingo" Little falls in love with the daughter of a left-wing (probably communist or socialist) leader called Charlotte Corday Rowbotham. In an attempt to get close to her, Little joins the group, called the Heralds of the Red Dawn, whose aims are to "massacre the bourgeoisie, sack Park Lane and disembowel the hereditary aristocracy". This...

Nothing in this world ever seems to be absolutely perfect, and that is certainly the case in this story. Young Billy, in love with a young and beautiful woman, attempts to woo her by making plans to rescue someone with his trusted group of friends. However, the scheme doesn't quite go according to plan, and the consequences are not necessarily as d...

This tale is a cultural insight into the exotic land of India. Based in Narsipur, where panthers and leopards are hunted, the narrator is assisted in this story by local shikari, Subhar. He is unlike other natives, and the pair adventure together in this compelling study of life in India and story of big game hunting.

A surprisingly shocking short story which is darkly comical, mainly concerning female submission and the necessary loss of identity to survive in an unfair male-dominated world. Humphrey's mother meets an intriguing stranger at a dance and agrees to go for a walk with him. The events that follow shape the rest of her life, that of her husband and o...

Actor J. Kingston Platt makes an appearance in this amusing story about a supposed 'get away' to the country that is not all that it seems. Asked by his agent to accompany him and his girlfriend down to a country cottage in the Cotswolds, Kigston Platt reluctantly agrees, to find out that there is more to the trip than meets the eye. Entangled furt...

An insight into early science fiction full of marvelous imagination and rare scientific genius reaching far beyond the author's time.

When Irish protagonist Bryden suffers from blood poisoning, his doctor advises him to go on a voyage overseas to aid his recuperation. He travels to Ireland from New York, and on returning home he gets a job - also a big shock at how different Ireland is to New York...and starts to reevaluate the advantages of a slower, village life.

One of Joyce's celebrated tales from his 'Dubliners' collection, which follows Maria, a likeable maid, as she travels from work to her make-shift-family home. Written in Joyce's famous train-of-consciousness style, his words work well on audio, especially when read in T.P. McKenna's lyrical and nimble Irish tone.

A day in the life of Farrington, an Irish man X who faces daily trials and tribulations in this anthropological story from James Joyce's Dubliners. A listener hears Farrington's tribulation-full journey from the office, to the pub and home. This tale makes no judgments but portrays a life-beaten man who is neither entirely wrong nor right in his ow...

From Dubliners: The Dead - At a party, Gabriel Conroy offends three women and realizes in an epiphany that passionless people like himself are already dead. At 15-16,000 words this story has also been classified as a novella. The Dead was adapted to film by John Huston, written for the screen by his son Tony and starring his daughter Anjelica as M...

The story involves a boy, the narrator, and his friend, Mahony, taking a day off from school and going to the shore, to seek adventure in their otherwise dull lives. As the narrator says, "The mimic warfare of the evening became at last as wearisome to me as the routine of school in the morning because I wanted real adventures to happen to myself....

Eveline is short story from James Joyce's celebrated short story collection 'Dubliners'. It begins with Eveline, a nineteen-year-old girl, who has met a sailor, Frank, who has convinced her to run away to Buenos Aires with him. Should she go with Frank, or remain in Ireland, her homeland? This beautiful story gives great insight into the predicamen...

After a Dublin 'tea taster', salesman Tom Kernan loses consciousness while drunk and takes a nasty fall down the stairs. His friends, who want to help rescue Kernan from inevitable consequences of his flawed ways, gather in his bedroom and talk about a catholic retreat, which is taking place for the benefit of businessmen. They persuade him to atte...

W. W. Jacobs was one of the most popular English humorists of the early twentieth century. His stories, many of them amusing tales of life along the London docks, were much in demand by magazine publishers, as his name on the cover assured wide sales.

The story is an illustration of the power of Mrs Hauksbee. (It is Kipling's third story about her in book form.) Tarrion, a "clever and amusing" young officer in an unfashionable regiment, longs for a permanent appointment in Simla. There he has the good fortune to do Mrs Hauksbee a favour, and in return is due his reward.