-
Hot Pick
Atlas Shrugged
What happens when the world’s thinkers, builders, and dreamers vanish, one by one, into silence? Atlas Shrugged is a thunderous epic set in a collapsing civilization, where the engines of progress are halted by a society that punishes excellence and rewards mediocrity. Amid the smoke of industry and the ruins of broken ideals, a defiant few must decide: is it moral to serve a world that drains your soul—or to walk away and let it crumble? With sweeping prose and unflinching vision, this novel challenges the very foundations of duty, ambition, and what it means to live with purpose. It is a story of resistance, of love forged in fire, and of the relentless power of the human mind.
- Originally Published: 1957
- Publisher: Signet, 2004
- Genre: Fiction
- Pages: 1088
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN: 9780451191144
- Access: Members
-
Hot Pick
The Master and Margarita
A mysterious foreigner arrives in Soviet Moscow—charming, diabolical, and accompanied by a talking cat with a taste for vodka—and soon reality begins to unravel. The Master and Margarita is a fever dream of love and damnation, where satire waltzes with the supernatural and truth is as dangerous as it is elusive. As a condemned writer and a fearless woman navigate a world haunted by betrayal, bureaucracy, and a whisper of the divine, the line between good and evil blurs like ink in water. Can love survive the tyranny of both politics and the soul? This is a novel where the devil gets the last laugh—and perhaps, the last mercy.
- Originally Published: 1967
- Publisher : Vintage Classics, 2024
- Pages: 448
- Genre: Romance novel, Satire, Fantasy
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN-13: 978-0099540946
- Access: Members
-
Hot Pick
One Hundred Years of Solitude
In the mythical town of Macondo, time coils in circles and generations of the Buendía family are caught in a spell of love, loss, and prophecy. One Hundred Years of Solitude is a lyrical epic where magic bleeds into the everyday, and history repeats itself with tragic elegance. Through political revolutions, spectral visitations, and forbidden passions, the novel asks: can a family escape the fate woven into its name—or is solitude the inheritance of memory itself? Lush, surreal, and aching with beauty, this is a story where the past never dies and the future is already written in the stars.
- Originally Published: 1967
- Publisher : Penguin Books, 2024
- Pages: 422
- Genre: Novel, Magical Realism, Family saga, Epic Fiction
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN-13: 978-0241968581
- Access: Members
-
The Idiot
In a world driven by vanity, power, and concealed wounds, what place is there for pure goodness? The Idiot follows Prince Myshkin—a man of childlike honesty and saintly compassion—whose return to Russian society sets off a quiet storm of obsession, betrayal, and unspoken despair. As he moves through a web of wounded souls and fevered passions, his innocence becomes both a beacon and a curse, casting light on the madness that masquerades as reason. Is it folly to live with an unguarded heart—or is it the only form of sanity left? With haunting tenderness and tragic irony, this luminous novel exposes the cruel bewilderment of a society that cannot recognize grace, even as it longs for it.
- Originally Published: 1869
- Publisher : Everyman’s Library, 2002
- Pages: 632
- Genre: Novel
- Book Type: Hardcopy/Hardcover
- ISBN-13: 978-1857152548
- Access: Prime Membership
-
Hot Pick
Pride & Prejudice
In a world where marriage is both a social ladder and a battlefield, Pride & Prejudice unfolds as a sparkling duel of intellect, wit, and wounded hearts. Elizabeth Bennet, fierce in mind and spirit, meets her match in the proud and enigmatic Mr. Darcy—yet behind their verbal skirmishes lies a deeper reckoning with class, character, and the illusions we cast on others and ourselves. Can love survive first impressions, or is true intimacy only forged through humility and hard-won understanding? With its graceful prose and sharp social commentary, this is a tale where decorum masks desire, and every glance or silence carries the weight of unspoken truths. Elegant, biting, and deeply human, it is a love story that resists simplicity—just like the people at its heart.
- Originally Published: 1813
- Publisher : Wordsworth Classics, 1993
- Pages: 325
- Genre: Fiction, Romance novel, Satire, Regency romance, Novel of manners
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN-13: 978-1853260001
- Access: Members
-
The Great Gatsby
A glittering mansion, a mysterious millionaire, and a love that haunts the edges of every champagne-soaked evening—The Great Gatsby is a lyrical elegy for the American Dream and the illusions we chase in its name. Through the eyes of a quiet outsider, we are drawn into the world of Jay Gatsby, a man who builds his fortune not for power or glory, but for a woman he lost long ago. Beneath the dazzle of Jazz Age opulence lies a tale of longing, betrayal, and the quiet ache of dreams deferred. Can one truly rewrite the past—or does the past rewrite us? Fitzgerald’s novel is both seduction and lament, a mirror held up to the heart’s most extravagant hopes.
- Originally Published: 1925
- Publisher : Vintage Classics, 2010
- Genre: Novel, Tragedy
- Pages: 148
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN-13: 9780099541530
- Access: Members
-
Jude the Obscure
In Jude the Obscure, Thomas Hardy traces the aching path of a man whose dreams of learning, love, and belonging crumble beneath the grinding weight of class, convention, and fate. Jude Fawley, a stonemason with the soul of a scholar, reaches toward the promise of knowledge and connection, only to find himself punished for daring to hope beyond his station. At once tender and merciless, the novel asks: what becomes of a heart that dares to defy the world’s design, only to be shattered by it? Hardy delivers a bleak, unflinching meditation on aspiration and despair, where love is both salvation and ruin, and idealism can be the most tragic burden of all. This is not merely the story of a man—but of humanity caught between what it is and what it longs to be.
- Originally Published: 1895
- Publisher : Wordsworth Editions Ltd, 1993
- Genre: Novel
- Pages: 376
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN-13: 978-1853262616
- Access: Members
-
Hot Pick
Anna Karenina
Beneath the glittering ballrooms and snowbound estates of imperial Russia, Anna Karenina unfolds as a sweeping tale of passion, betrayal, and the fragile architecture of human happiness. Caught between the demands of a rigid society and the call of her own heart, Anna dares to pursue love at any cost—only to find that desire can both liberate and destroy. Around her, lives intersect in a delicate ballet of hope and despair, raising a timeless question: can true fulfillment ever exist within the confines of duty, marriage, and convention? Lyrical and unflinching, Tolstoy’s masterpiece captures the full spectrum of the human soul, from ecstasy to ruin.
- Originally Published: 1873
- Publisher: Penguin Books, 2002
- Genre: Novel
- Pages: 880
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN: 978-0140449174
- Access: Members
-
On Earth as It Is on Television
When mysterious alien ships appear over Earth and vanish without explanation, humanity is left not with answers, but with questions—and a gnawing sense of cosmic irrelevance. In On Earth as It Is on Television, Emily Jane crafts a tender, absurdist tapestry of modern life, where suburban dads unravel, teenagers drift through existential ennui, and even cats seem to know more than they let on. Through shifting perspectives and sly humor, the novel explores how ordinary people navigate the extraordinary—and how the real invasion might be the one inside us all. Is the universe trying to tell us something, or are we simply too distracted to listen?
- Originally Published: June 2023
- Publisher: Hyperion Avenue, 2023
- Genre: Novel, Sci-Fi
- Pages: 352
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN: 978-1368092999
- Access: Members
-
Hot Pick
Animal Farm
On a quiet farm, where the animals rise in revolt against their human masters, an ideal of freedom is born—only to curdle into tyranny beneath the hoofprints of power. Animal Farm is a fable sharpened into a political blade, where noble dreams decay into slogans, and those who promise equality learn to walk upright over the backs of others. How does liberation become a new form of control, and why do the oppressed so often trade one master for another? With deceptively simple prose and chilling clarity, this tale reveals that the most dangerous lies are the ones we tell ourselves. A story for every age, it asks: who truly governs when all are supposed to be free?
- Originally Published: August 1945
- Genre: Novella, Political Satire
- Pages: 101
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN: 9780451526342
- Access: Members
-
Hot Pick
The Brothers Karamazov
The Brothers Karamazov is a tempest of faith, passion, and blood—where three brothers, torn by guilt, desire, and spiritual hunger, are drawn into a patricide that becomes a mirror for their own souls. Beneath the mystery of their father’s violent death lies a deeper trial: of God, of free will, and of the human heart’s capacity for both light and depravity. Can love redeem the chaos we inherit, or is every soul bound to wrestle alone with the divine and the absurd? Lyrical and relentless, this epic unearths the moral labyrinth at the core of every family—and every man. A novel as intimate as a confession and as vast as a cathedral.
- Originally Published: November 1880
- Publisher: Penguin Classic, 2003
- Genre: Novel
- Pages: 1056
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN: 978-0679410034
- Access: Prime Membership
-
Hot Pick
Brave New World
In a world engineered for comfort, pleasure, and perfect order, what becomes of the soul that aches for meaning? Brave New World unfolds in a gleaming dystopia where humanity has traded truth for tranquility and freedom for engineered bliss. Yet beneath the narcotic hum of conformity, a quiet rebellion stirs—one that questions whether a life without pain is worth living at all. With eerie grace and razor-edged irony, this is a tale of longing in a society that has forgotten how to long.
- Originally Published: 1932
- Publisher: Vintage Classics, 2004
- Genre: Novel, Science fiction, Dystopian Fiction
- Pages: 229
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN: 978-0099477464
- Access: Members
-
Hot Pick
1984 (Nineteen Eighty-Four)
In a world where every thought is monitored and every truth is manufactured, one man dares to remember what it means to be free. 1984 is a harrowing descent into a society ruled by fear, where language is weaponized, love is treason, and the past is endlessly rewritten. As the walls close in, the quiet rebellion of a solitary mind becomes a question with no easy answer: can the human spirit survive when even reality is no longer its own? Stark, prophetic, and unrelenting, this is a story of resistance in the age of absolute control.
- Originally Published: June 8, 1949
- Publisher: Penguin Books, 2008
- Genre: Science fiction, Dystopian Fiction, Social science fiction, Political fiction
- Pages: 1231
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN: 978-0241969694
- Access: Members
-
Mrs Dalloway
On a single day in postwar London, Clarissa Dalloway prepares for a party—yet beneath the flutter of silk and social ritual lies a deep current of memory, regret, and quiet defiance. Mrs Dalloway is a luminous meditation on time and identity, where past and present shimmer and collide in the minds of those touched by love, loss, and the wounds of war. As Big Ben tolls the hours, what does it mean to truly live—when life is composed of fleeting moments and unspoken thoughts? Intimate and expansive, this is a novel that listens to the silence between words and finds entire worlds within.
- Originally Published: May 14, 1925
- Publisher: Vintage Classics Library, 2016
- Genre: Novel, Psychological Fiction
- Pages: 172
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN: 978-1784871697
- Access: Members
-
Hard Times
In the soot-stained city of Coketown, where facts are sacred and imagination is a crime, lives are measured in productivity and hearts are left to wither. Hard Times tells the story of those caught in the iron grip of industry and ideology—children molded into machines, love reduced to calculation, and wonder smothered by cold logic. Yet even in this world of grinding gears and grim utilitarianism, a question lingers: can the soul survive where only numbers matter? With biting wit and deep compassion, this is a tale of rebellion not in battle, but in the quiet persistence of feeling, curiosity, and hope.
- Originally Published: August 12, 1854
- Publisher: Penguin Classics, 1985
- Genre: Novel
- Pages: 328
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN: 978-0140430424
- Access: Members
-
Hot Pick
Things Fall Apart
In a land where tradition sings through drumbeats and ancestral fire, Things Fall Apart follows Okonkwo, a fierce warrior haunted by fear of failure and consumed by a need to escape his father’s shame. As colonial forces creep into the Igbo world, bringing both alien faith and foreign rule, the fragile balance between honor and change begins to crack. Through stark prose and lyrical intensity, the novel confronts a painful paradox: when the old ways falter, is it strength or surrender that preserves the soul? What happens to a man—and a people—when the pillars of their world begin to crumble? Achebe crafts a haunting elegy for a culture on the cusp of dissolution, where dignity and downfall are bound in the same breath.
- Originally Published: 1958
- Publisher: Penguin Books, 1994
- Genre: Novel
- Pages: 209
- Book Type: Hardcopy
- ISBN: 9780385474542
- Access: Members