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The setting, geography and history of this story by Rev'd Sabine Baring-Gould, author of Onward Christian Soldiers and a number of other well-known hymns, are all accurate, or at least as accurate as local lore will allow. Kinver has long been a midlands beauty spot, and the UK National Trust own and open one of the rock-dwellings mentioned. The 'Stewponey' too was an inn until a year or two into the twenty-first century: http://www.blackcountrybugle.co.uk/News/Reminder-of-the-heyday-of-the-old-Stewponey-2.htm http://www.blackcountrybugle.co.uk/News/Reminder-of-the-heyday-of-the-old-Stewponey-2.htm - the present reader having stopped there for a drink and a meal many times. The story, whether you call it a romance, a historical novel or a horror story - comprising as it does a young woman being offered as a prize in a bowling match, a wife-burning, highwaymen and buried treasure - is of course wholly fiction. (Introduction by AJM)...

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Fiction, Historical Fiction, Horror/Ghost stories, Romance

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Well, Robin, on what folly do you employ yourself? Do you cut sticks for our fire o' mornings? Thus spoke Master Hugh Fitzooth, King's Ranger of the Forest at Locksley, as he entered his house. Robin flushed a little. These are arrows, sir, he announced, holding one up for inspection. Dame Fitzooth smiled upon the boy as she rose to meet her lord. What fortune do you bring us to-day, father? asked she, cheerily. Fitzooth's face was a mask of discontent. I bring myself, dame, answered he, neither more nor less. Surely that is enough for Robin and me! laughed his wife. Come, cast off your shoes, and give me your bow and quiver. I have news for you, Hugh, even if you have none for us. George of Gamewell has sent his messenger to-day, and bids me bring Robin to him for the Fair. She hesitated to give the whole truth. (Summary by Vallabh Papdiwala)...

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Adventure, Fiction, Historical Fiction

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Edgar Wallace, perhaps best known for creating King Kong, wrote dozens of novels. The Green Rust, his twelfth crime novel, is one of three books he published in 1919. It begins at the English home of the severely ill American millionaire, John Millinborn. With him are his best friend, Kitson, and a local doctor, the Dutch (or is he?) van Heerden. He is murdered in the first chapter, having just left his fortune to his niece, Oliva, whom he has never met. Before he dies, he asks Kitson to find and watch over Oliva. (Introduction by Kirsten Wever)...

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Mystery, Fiction

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Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a late 14th-century Middle English alliterative romance outlining an adventure of Sir Gawain, a knight of King Arthur's Round Table. In the tale, Sir Gawain accepts a challenge from a mysterious warrior who is completely green, from his clothes and hair to his beard and skin. The Green Knight offers to allow anyone to strike him with his axe if the challenger will take a return blow in a year and a day. Gawain accepts, and beheads him in one blow, only to have the Green Knight stand up, pick up his head, and remind Gawain to meet him at the appointed time. The story of Gawain's struggle to meet the appointment and his adventures along the way demonstrate the spirit of chivalry and loyalty. (Wikipedia) This 20th Century rendering is by WA Neilson....

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Fiction, Literature

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In The Marrow of Tradition , Charles W. Chesnutt--using the 1898 Wilmington, North Carolina massacre as a backdrop--probes and exposes the raw nerves and internal machinery of racism in the post-Reconstruction-era South; explores how miscegenation, caste, gender and the idea of white supremacy informed Jim Crow laws; and unflinchingly revisits the most brutal of terror tactics, mob lynchings. (Introduction by James K. White)...

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Fiction, Historical Fiction

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An ex-convict breaks parole and starts a new life as a righteous man, but is pursued by a police inspector. Along the way, the ex-convict joins a revolution, adopts a daughter, and beats people up. Hooray. (Summary by smileyman457)...

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Fiction, Romance

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Every status-quo-caste society in history has left open two roads to rise above your caste: The Priest and The Warrior. But in a society of TV and tranquilizers--the Warrior acquires a strange new meaning... (Introduction from the Gutenberg text)...

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Fiction, Science fiction

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Illegitimacy, false identity, and bankruptcy are the major elements of Sir Walter Scott's 1816 novel, The Antiquary. Set in the period of the French Revolution, the novel's hero, Lovel, struggles to gain repute and the hand of his beloved despite his uncertain parentage. During these pursuits, he befriends the title's antiquary, Johnathan Oldbuck, who finds Lovel a captive audience to his scholarly studies and a tragic likeness to his own disappointments in love. Readers will discover whether Lovel's acts of bravery and courage ultimately earn him the birth and fortunes of a nobleman. (Summary by S. Kovalchik)...

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Fiction, Romance

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Breckinridge Elkins is the roughest, toughest, fastest-shootin', hardest-fightin' feller in the Bear Creek settlement, and probably in the entire Humbolt Mountains. As he travels further from home, he single-handedly takes on outlaws, settles (and starts) feuds and tries his hand at romancing the girls. He also discovers a lot of strange customs among other folks, such as building houses out of boards and wearing clothes that ain't buckskins. Set in Nevada during the late 1800's, this collection of stories is a great rollicking romp through the American frontier as seen through the eyes of one of the most enjoyable characters created in the history of tall tales. (Summary by RK Wilcox)...

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Westerns, Fiction, Short stories

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Third book in the Chautauqua Girls series. Written by Isabella Alden under the pseudonym Pansy.Ruth's father brings home a wife and daughter, after 18 years, that Ruth had never known about. Suddenly she is no longer the queen of her home. And what's worse, the new mother and sister are rude and antagonistic. How will Ruth bear this cross? (Summary by Tricia G)...

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Fiction, Religion, Romance

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This classic 1922 fantasy novel brings you to a strange and lovely world where a young lord wrestles King Gorice for his land's freedom, where unscalable mountains can only be conquered by stubbornness and hippogriffs, where the great explorer Lord Gro finds himself continually driven to betrayal, where sweet young women occasionally fall for evil wizards, and where the heroes actually win their hearts' desire. (Summary by www.archive.org)...

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Fantasy, Fiction

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The novel formally inverts Don Quixote: as the don mistakes himself for the knightly hero of a Romance, so Arabella mistakes herself for the maiden love of a Romance. While the don thinks it his duty to praise the Platonically pure damsels he meets (such as the woman he loves), so Arabella believes it is in her power to kill with a look and it is the duty of her lovers to suffer ordeals on her behalf....

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Fiction, Satire, Romance, Erotica, History

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Immature Mr. Tresevant (from The King's Daughter) comes to Newton with his spoiled wife to be the new pastor of the church attended by Dr. and Mrs. Douglass, Mr. and Mrs. Sayles, and Mr. and Mrs. Tyndall (from Ester Ried and Julia Ried), boarding with Jerome and Abbie Sayles. Authored by Isabella M. Alden under the pen name Pansy. Fourth in the Ester Ried series. (Summary written by TriciaG.)...

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Fiction, Religion

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The story follows the adventures of Sir Philip Harclay, who returns to medieval England to find that the castle seat and estate of his friend Lord Lovel have been usurped. A series of revelations, horrors and betrayals climax in a scene of single combat in which good battles evil for the return of the prize. (Summary from Wikipedia)...

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Fiction, Historical Fiction, Horror/Ghost stories

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This is the story of Miriam, an orphan Christian woman living in Rome in the first century. She falls in love with a Roman officer, but knows that her Jewish childhood playmate loves her too- and will do anything in order to get her love in return. (Summary by Stav Nisser)...

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Adventure, Fiction, Historical Fiction, Religion, Romance

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David Copperfield or The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery was first published in 1850. Like all except five of his works, it originally appeared in serial form. Many elements within the novel follow events in Dickens' own life, and it is probably the most autobiographical of all of his novels. It is also Dickens' favorite child. (Summary adapted from Wikipedia)...

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Fiction, Literature

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A young man named Anodos experiences dream-like adventures in Fairy Land, where he meets tree-spirits, endures the presence of the overwhelming shadow, journeys to the palace of the fairy queen, and searches for the spirit of the earth. The story conveys a profound sadness and a poignant longing for death....

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Fantasy, Fiction

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Henry Beechtree, a newspaper correspondent for the British Bolshevist, is covering the latest otherwise sleepy session of the League of Nations in Geneva, when the newly elected President – a member of the Norwegian delegation – disappears mysteriously, adding some badly needed ‘spice’ to Henry's assignment. (Introduction by Cathy Barratt)...

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Mystery, Fiction, Adventure

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This is one of the earliest Gothic novels. The Caliph Vathek is one of the wealthiest and most powerful men who ever lived. But this is not enough for him. He seeks also forbidden knowledge, and doesn't care who he has to hurt to get it. Aided by his depraved mother Carathis, Vathek proceeds to damn himself, and those around him. (Introduction by MorganScorpion)...

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Fiction, Horror/Ghost stories, Mystery

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A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is an 1889 novel by American humorist and writer Mark Twain. The work is a very early example of time travel in literature, anticipating by six years H. G. Wells' The Time Machine of 1895 (however, unlike Wells, Twain does not give any real explanation of his protagonist's traveling in time). Some early editions are entitled A Yankee at the Court of King Arthur....

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Literature, Fiction, Humor, Historical Fiction