Some very good fiction
Discover some very good fiction with our curated list of top books. Explore captivating stories, bestselling novels, and must-read fiction for every book lover.
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Santa's Little Helpers
by W. A. Heisler
Denis McKutchin is having a bad week. HeÂżs just been paroled from prison. His girlfriend threw him out. His son wonÂżt speak to him and to top it all off, as a condition of his parole, he has to do community service at an orphanage with the rest of his gang. Upon his release, heÂżs met by Tiny, a member of his crew. Tiny tells him about a truckload of toys destined for the children of the orphanage for Christmas being hijacked. He then tries desperately to get McKutchin to think up a plan to get the truck back. But McKutchin has a plan of his own for one big heist in mid-town. Can his mind be changed? SantaÂżs Little Helpers is a journey filled with quirky characters. ItÂżs a story about a group of misfits who find themselves in the middle of the FBI, the mob and drugs . . . All in an effort to steal back Christmas.
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An American Christmas
by W. A. Heisler
An American Christmas is a holiday collection that emphasizes that the true gifts of Christmas are the ones we love. Consisting of five stories about ordinary people going through extraordinary circumstances, the book stresses the power of faith and love to help overcome the hardest of times. With a fast-paced style of storytelling, W. A. Heisler delivers five modern day parables set in eras ranging from World War II France to modern day America. Through a sleek style, peppered with humor, the author tells five stories readers have called "heart-warming" and "engrossing". An American Christmas slices through the materialism that has come to surround the holiday to reveal what the day is truly about
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Journal of the Gun Years
by Richard Matheson
Clay Halser, a survivor of the Civil War, must flee to frontier America when he kills a man in self-defense, and his action brings him notoriety as a gunslinger and encounters with Billy the Kid and Wild Bill Hickock.
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The Beardless Warriors
by Richard Matheson
A squad of teenaged American soldiers fight their way across Germany in 1945.
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Requiem
by Graham Joyce
After the sudden death of his wife, Tom Webster travels to Jerusalem in search of a friend from his college days. The haunted city, divided by warring religious factions, offers him no refuge from his guilt and grief. As he is wandering through the streets and the archaeological sites, a mysterious old woman appears to Tom and delivers messages that seem beyond his comprehension. But a fragment of the Dead Sea Scrolls that had been kept hidden by an old Jewish innkeeper appears to offer the key to understanding the apparition. Driven to the edge of insanity, Tom believes the spirit of Mary Magdalene is trying to reveal the hidden history of the Resurrection, and he struggles to reconcile the distant past with his own future before the threads of his identity unravel.
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Of Mice and Men
by John Steinbeck
A controversial tale of friendship and tragedy during the Great Depression, in a deluxe centennial edition Over seventy-five years since its first publication, Steinbeck’s tale of commitment, loneliness, hope, and loss remains one of America’s most widely read and taught novels. An unlikely pair, George and Lennie, two migrant workers in California during the Great Depression, grasp for their American Dream. They hustle work when they can, living a hand-to-mouth existence. For George and Lennie have a plan: to own an acre of land and a shack they can call their own. When they land jobs on a ranch in the Salinas Valley, the fulfillment of their dream seems to be within their grasp. But even George cannot guard Lennie from the provocations, nor predict the consequences of Lennie's unswerving obedience to the things George taught him. Of Mice and Men represents an experiment in form, which Steinbeck described as “a kind of playable novel, written in a novel form but so scened and set that it can be played as it stands.” A rarity in American letters, it achieved remarkable success as a novel, a Broadway play, and three acclaimed films. This Centennial edition, specially designed to commemorate one hundred years of Steinbeck, features french flaps and deckle-edged pages. For more than sixty-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,500 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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The Pearl
by John Steinbeck
“There it lay, the great pearl, perfect as the moon.” One of Steinbeck’s most taught works, The Pearl is the story of the Mexican diver Kino, whose discovery of a magnificent pearl from the Gulf beds means the promise of a better life for his impoverished family. His dream blinds him to the greed and suspicions the pearl arouses in him and his neighbors, and even his loving wife Juana cannot temper his obsession or stem the events leading to tragedy. This classic novella from Nobel Prize-winner John Steinbeck examines the fallacy of the American dream, and illustrates the fall from innocence experienced by people who believe that wealth erases all problems. This Centennial edition, specially designed to commemorate one hundred years of Steinbeck, features french flaps and deckle-edged pages. For more than sixty-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,500 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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For Whom the Bell Tolls
by Ernest Hemingway
A book about love and courage and decency and glory. It is written with a wisdom that washes the mind and cools it. With an understanding that rips the heart with compassion.
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Fever 42
by Christopher Fahy
Ted, an English teacher, has found that life has become dull until Joy comes along. Joy takes him on a soul-shattering trip that makes his spirit soar. Alive for the first time in years, he revels in his wild trysts with Joy--a student at his high school. "Wildly funny and surprisingly sad. . . made me think of the early J.D. Salinger period. Christopher is a wonderful writer."--Stephen King.
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Wolf Whistle
by Lewis Nordan
In 1955, in Arrow-Catcher, Mississippi, fourth-grade teacher Alice Conroy, hoping to teach her children something important, takes her class on field trips to the bedside of a terminally burned classmate, the sewage plant, a funeral parlor, and a murder trial.
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The Temple of Gold
by William Goldman
Acclaimed for such Academy Award—winning screenplays as Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and such thrillers as Marathon Man, not to mention the bestselling classic The Princess Bride, William Goldman stands as one of the most beloved writers in America. But long before these triumphs, he caused a sensation with his brilliant first novel, a powerful story of reckless youth that was hailed as a worthy rival to The Catcher in the Rye. THE TEMPLE OF GOLD Ray Trevitt is coming of age in the American midwest of the late 1950s. Handsome, restless, eager to live life and to find his place in the world, Ray hurtles headlong through a young man’s rite of passage–searching for answers and somewhere to belong. What he discovers is that within friendships and love affairs, army tours and married life, victory and tragedy, lie the experiences that will shape his destiny, scar his soul, and ultimately teach him profound lessons he never expected.
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The Girl Next Door
by Jack Ketchum
A teenage girl is held captive and brutally tortured by neighborhood children. Based on a true story, this shocking novel reveals the depravity of which we are all capable.
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The Catcher in the Rye
by J.D. Salinger
The "brilliant, funny, meaningful novel" (The New Yorker) that established J. D. Salinger as a leading voice in American literature--and that has instilled in millions of readers around the world a lifelong love of books. "If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth." The hero-narrator of The Catcher in the Rye is an ancient child of sixteen, a native New Yorker named Holden Caufield. Through circumstances that tend to preclude adult, secondhand description, he leaves his prep school in Pennsylvania and goes underground in New York City for three days.
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Boy's Life
by Robert McCammon
"Zephyr, Alabama, has been an idyllic home for eleven-year-old Cory Mackenson ... a place where monsters swim in the belly of the river, and friends are forever. Then, on a cold spring morning in 1964, as Cory accompanies his father on his milk route, they see a car plunge into a lake some say is bottomless."--Page 4 of cover
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The Outsiders
by S. E. Hinton
When it was first published in 1967, The Outsiders defied convention with its immediate, deeply sympathetic portrayal of Ponyboy and his struggle to find a place for himself in a difficult world. Thirty years later, it speaks to teenagers as powerfully as ever.
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Flowers for Algernon
by Daniel Keyes
A mentally retarded adult has a brain operation that turns him into a genius.
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The Rag and Bone Shop
by Robert Cormier
Twelve-year old Jason is accused of the brutal murder of a young girl. Is he innocent or guilty? The shocked town calls on an interrogator with a stellar reputation: he always gets a confession. The confrontation between Jason and his interrogator forms the chilling climax of this terrifying look at what can happen when the pursuit of justice becomes a personal crusade for victory at any cost.
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Heroes
by Robert Cormier
Francis Joseph Cassavant is eighteen. He has just returned home from the Second World War, and he has no face. He does have a gun and a mission: to murder his childhood hero. Francis lost most of his face when he fell on a grenade in France. He received the Silver Star for bravery, but was it really an act of heroism? Now, having survived, he is looking for a man he once admired and respected, a man adored by many people, a man who also received a Silver Star for bravery. A man who destroyed Francis's life. Francis lost most of his face when he fell on a grenade in France. He received the Silver Star for bravery, but was it really an act of heroism? Now, having survived, he is looking for a man he once admired and respected, a man adored by many people, a man who also received a Silver Star for bravery. A man who destroyed Francis's life. -->
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We All Fall Down
by Robert Cormier
They entered the house at 9:02 P.M. and trashed their way through the Cape Cod cottage. At 9:46 P.M. Karen Jerome made the mistake of arriving home early. Thrown down the basement stairs, Karen slips into a coma. The trashers slip away. But The Avenger has seen it all.
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The Incredible Shrinking Man
by Richard Matheson
A collection of writings by Richard Matheson, including the novel "The Incredible Shrinking Man."
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Breaking Point
by Christopher Fahy
Mystery thriller set in the grim reality of America's seriously flawed health care delivery system.