'A day without laughter is a day wasted.'It is Christmas Day when Charlie Chaplin receives a visit from Death. The great actor is 82 years old, but not yet ready to face the final curtain. Desperate to see his teenage son grow up, the actor strikes a deal: if he manages to make Death laugh, he will win an extra year of life. As he awaits his final, fatal encounter, Chaplin composes an impassioned letter to his son, in which he attempts to tell him about his past, from his ...

The Great Gatsby is F. Scott Fitzgerald’s great American novel; sublime, deftly written, at times wickedly funny, and always tightly under control by a master of the language who was at the top of his powers. In Gatsby, Fitzgerald explored the Jazz Age with an intimate knowledge and perception that no other writer could have matched. Much of the happenings in the novel are pulled directly from Fitzgerald’s own hedonistic experiences. A cautionary tale about reaching for the American Dream ...

In this “powerful” blockbuster of a novel (The New York Times), the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Independence Day introduces his most beloved character, failed novelist turned sportswriter Frank Bascombe, during an Easter weekend, as he moves through the great losses of his life.As a sportswriter, Frank Bascombe makes his living studying people—men, mostly—who live entirely within themselves. This is a condition that Frank himself aspires to. ...

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • In a dazzling work of historical fiction in the vein of Nancy Horan’s Loving Frank, Dawn Tripp brings to life Georgia O’Keeffe, her love affair with photographer Alfred Stieglitz, and her quest to become an independent artist.This is not a love story. If it were, we would have the same story. But he has his, and I have mine.In 1916, Georgia O’Keeffe is a young, unknown art teacher when she travels to New York to meet ...

For more than sixty years, the imagination of Ray Bradbury has opened doors into remarkable places, ushering us across unexplored territories of the heart and mind while leading us inexorably toward a profound understanding of ourselves and the universe we inhabit. In this landmark volume, America's preeminent storyteller offers us one hundred treasures from alifetime of words and ideas -- tales that amaze, enthrall, and horrify; breathtaking journeys backward and forward in time; classic ...

Born into a theatrical family, Chaplin's father died of drink while his mother, unable to bear the poverty, suffered from bouts of insanity, Chaplin embarked on a film-making career which won him immeasurable success, as well as intense controversy. His extraordinary autobiography was first published in 1964 and was written almost entirely without reference to documentation - simply as an astonishing feat of memory by a 75 year old man. It is an incomparably vivid reconstruction of a poor ...

With his disarmingly simple style and complex imagination, Ray Bradbury has seized the minds of American readers for decades.This collection showcases thirty-two of Bradbury's most famous tales in which he lays bare the depths of the human soul. The thrilling title story, A Sound of Thunder, tells of a hunter sent on safari -- sixty million years in the past. But all it takes is one wrong step in the prehistoric jungle to stamp out the life of a delicate and harmless butterfly -- and possi...

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (1896–1940) was an American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigmatic writings of the Jazz Age, a term he coined. Includes short stories collections: All the Sad Young Men; Taps at Reveille; and the short story The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and fifty-five (55) other short stories.Today, F. Scott Fitzgerald is known for his novels, but in his lifetime, his fame stemmed from his prolific achievement as one of America's most gifted...

Nexus, the last book of Henry Miller's epic trilogy The Rosy Crucifixion, is widely considered to be one of the landmarks of American fiction. In it, Miller vividly recalls his many years as a down-and-out writer in New York City, his friends, mistresses, and the unusual circumstances of his eventful life.

In a quaint old restaurant, a chef relies on a devilish secret ingredientIn Sbirro's restaurant, there is no electric lighting, no music, and no menu. The only sound is the contented sighs of the regulars, who come every night in hopes that Sbirro will treat them to his signature dish, the famed lamb Amirstan, which comes from a beast so rare, only Sbirro knows how to obtain it. Tonight, two diners at this spectacular relic of a forgotten age will find that lamb Ami...

A truly unprecedented literary achievement by author and editor Lawrence Block, a newly-commissioned anthology of seventeen superbly-crafted stories inspired by the paintings of Edward Hopper, including Jeffery Deaver, Joyce Carol Oates, Stephen King, Lee Child, and Robert Olen Butler, among many others."Edward Hopper is surely the greatest American narrative painter. His work bears special resonance for writers and readers, and yet his paintings never tell a story...