DescriptionIt was a broadcaster's worst nightmare: dead air, in the true sense. A radio host's on-air guest is anything but live, dropping dead after chugging a sponsor's beverage. A hefty contingency fee prompts Nero Wolfe to snoop around. But the portly detective finds that all of the case's principal players lie through their teeth. Through the maze of deceit, Wolfe probes for the truth.
DescriptionJust as the style of a great writer cannot easily be imitated, the performance of a great reader is hard to duplicate. This volume features some of the best readers dramatizing some of the best writings. Paul Auster's In the Country of Last Things is read by Vanessa Redgrave; Amy Tan reads her own The Hundred Secret Senses ; Elizabeth Peña performs Isabel Allende's The Stories of Eva Luna ; Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep is read by Elliott Gould; Charles Dickens's Nicholas Nickleby is read by Paul Scofield; Jane Austen's Persuasion is read by Glenda Jackson; Robert James Waller's The Bridges of Madison County is performed by Waller, Ben Kingsley, and Isabella Rossellini; and Michael York reads The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas.
DescriptionThe Trespasser, first published in 1912, was Lawrence's second novel and foreshadowed the passion of Lady Chatterley's Lover . Helena Verden, a young woman in her late 20s, and Siegmund MacNair, her violin teacher, are in love. But there is more than one obstacle to their happiness. Siegmund is a married man with children and Helena is full of inhibitions. They spend a week together on the Isle of Wight, their passion remaining unrequited. When they return to London, Siegmund faces a deadlock. Tormented by his family's bitter reproaches, he is nonetheless unable to desert them for Helena. His solution to his dilemma turns a woman's longing for love into tragedy. Lawrence based his novel on the true-life experiences of his friend Helen Corke, as revealed in her diaries.
DescriptionBrad Denning's brother Petey is long lost. Frozen in time as a skinny nine-year-old bicycling away from his uncaring older brother, Petey haunts Brad's consciousness. To this day, within his prosperous life, Brad knows with certainty that he was responsib…
DescriptionHerzog is the story of Moses Herzog, great sufferer, joker, and moaner, cuckold, charmer, and man of our time. Seeing himself as a survivor of his private disasters, those of the age, Herzog cannot keep from asking what he calls the "piercing" questions. The answers he finds will matter not only to him but to listeners of Saul Bellow's magnificent novel.
DescriptionCarl Webster, the hot kid of the marshals service, is polite, respects his elders, and can shoot a man driving away in an Essex at 400 yards. Carl works out of the Tulsa, Oklahoma, federal courthouse during the 1930s, the period of America's most notoriou…
