St. Elmo

St. Elmo PDF Author: Augusta J. Evans
Publisher: Applewood Books
ISBN: 1429044888
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 518

Get Book Here

Book Description

St. Elmo

St. Elmo PDF Author: Augusta J. Evans
Publisher: Applewood Books
ISBN: 1429044888
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 518

Get Book Here

Book Description


St. Elmo's Fire

St. Elmo's Fire PDF Author: Nora Sojourner Chalfont
Publisher: Xlibris Corporation
ISBN: 1483649199
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 105

Get Book Here

Book Description
St. Elmo's Fire is a maritime phenomenon where natural electrical discharge, primarily from lightning, causes a ship's mast to glow. Its aura can be seen for miles, and it has been believed to be either an evil omen or a sign of protection and good luck at sea. Beginning in the Port of New York in fall, 1834, St. Elmo's Fire is a fast-paced story of adventure and misadventure. Twenty-year-old Donecha (DONecka) Van Fossen, bookish son of Irish-Dutch immigrant parents, manages to escape their dreary life and follow his dream of becoming a seaman. After his family's tenement is burned to the ground, Donecha is taken aboard the sailing ship Il Paradiso as tutor to the captain's son, eleven-year-old Lyle, who has been held captive at sea for most of his young life. Finding out why and by whom is the central mystery. As the bond between Donecha and Lyle grows, they discover that the true mission of Il Paradiso is twofold: to rescue Liana, Lyle's hidden sister, from the clutches of Mediterranean relatives who would seize both children and appropriate their rightful inheritance, and also to find their mysterious mother, who appears to Lyle as the "glow in the sky". Moving from the Port of New York across the Atlantic to various Mediterranean ports, and back, the travelers return shortly before the Great Fire of New York leveled most of lower Manhattan in December, 1835. Well into the nineteenth century, the stormy Atlantic was still open range for privateers, latter day pirates. Dramatic encounters and narrow escapes throughout the journey build suspense. The rescue effort involves intrigues, pursuits, betrayals, as well as merriment, humor and a touch of romance. In the end Il Paradiso succeeds where Il Purgatorio and Il Inferno have failed. In addition to Donecha and Lyle, other major characters include Mr. Crawdon, landlord, shipowner and father to Lyle; Slogo, the ship's galley cook; Lyle's sister, Liana; and Lyle's pet monkey, the Little Marqus. Characters are merry and scary, wry and sly. Linked into plot and character development are recurrent motifs of fires, secret passages, lively turnabouts of streotypes and the escapades of Lyle's clever little monkey. In the end, the wily Mr. Crawdon and the unlikely Slogo turn out to be the saviors of them all. Numerous character and plot shifts draw the reader to a surprising conclusion. St. Elmo's Fire is a family-oriented story, between 35,000 and 36,000 words, divided into 26 short chapters, It is suitable for family reading and late elementary or middle school readers, both boys and girls, or as a chapter book. The characters and situations are credible in context and historical and geographical detail is generally accurate. The story would be well illustrated with lively drawings, say pen and gouache. Cinematic potential.

The Blood Tartan

The Blood Tartan PDF Author: Raymond St. Elmo
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781521843741
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 298

Get Book Here

Book Description
Centuries ago a mysterious family of mad geniuses split into five clans; feuding, hiding, hoarding their secrets of fighting and art, magic and science. Now at the dawn of the mechanical 19th century, only the five clans united can hold back the blood-red tide of industrial apocalypse. Unless they dive into it laughing. I did say 'mad'

The Book in the Bottle

The Book in the Bottle PDF Author: Raymond St. Elmo
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781520443249
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 277

Get Book Here

Book Description
A family finds a mysterious bottle. Within the bottle, a book. Within the book, a story. And within the story their own adventure. Supposing a book were to appear sewn from all the different parts of your favorite stories. What could it be, but a tale of change? .Frogs become princes, orphans become kings, kings become beggars, milkmaids become knights. Duels become dances, tombs become houses, a deathly chase becomes a coronation. We read to children bedtime stories that warn them and promise them: all thing change. Then we click off the light, expecting them to be unchanged when they wake in the morning. In a bottle is a book, and in the book is a city built of pieces. In that city is a beggar who became a duke, a rat who becomes a cat, a song that became a promise. Ghosts, assassins, kings and cobblers shift and dance across this city, finding who they are by what story they tell of themselves. And in the very center of the dance, a man stands balanced on a wheel.From the book: I consider. "A good adventure story has a chase through a graveyard. There shall be a duel on a cliff by moonlight or firelight or lightning. There must be treasure. A magic ring. A haunted tomb and a ruined castle. Guards tricked, villains confounded. A lost heir, disguises, an assassin, ghosts, revenge, mutant tigers -" "What?" I ignore that. "- mutant tigers, an ancient battle between good and evil, an execution, a daring escape. There must be a prophecy that actually surprises, a final battle with an unexpected ending. There must be dull villagers, street-smart orphans and an impossibly clever-but-wicked noble villain." "What book is this?" I brush that aside. "No one book. It is my list of pieces from the best. Adventures by night in a graveyard are in Tom Sawyer, in Great Expectations, The Horse and His Boy, in Harry Potter. Duels are in The Three Musketeers and The Princess Bride. The Westing Game and The Three Musketeers have mystery and disguises. The Treasure of Alpheus Winterborn and The Hobbit and Treasure Island and Tom Sawyer have treasures and a mystery. The High King and The Mouse and His Child have a prophecy that actually surprises. Lord of The Rings has magic rings and ghosts and the lost heir and mutant tigers -" "Does not!" " -and The Beggar Princess and The Prince and The Pauper have the clever street-wise kids. Harry Potter and The Black Cauldron and The Sword in the Stone and Momo and The Wizard of Oz all have the crazy wizard and the orphan with a destiny and The Last Unicorn and Lud in the Mist and The Thirteen Clocks and Three Musketeers and The Princess Bride have the sly noble villain."I have to stop for breath. I must be getting old.

The Ponder Heart

The Ponder Heart PDF Author: Eudora Welty
Publisher: HMH
ISBN: 0547543921
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 159

Get Book Here

Book Description
“A wonderful tragicomedy” of a Mississippi family, a vast inheritance, and an impulsive heir, by the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Delta Wedding (The New York Times). Daniel Ponder is the amiable heir to the wealthiest family in Clay County, Mississippi. To friends and strangers, he’s also the most generous, having given away heirlooms, a watch, and so far, at least one family business. His niece, Edna Earle, has a solution to save the Ponder fortune from Daniel’s mortifying philanthropy: As much as she loves Daniel, she’s decided to have him institutionalized. Foolproof as the plan may seem, it comes with a kink—one that sets in motion a runaway scheme of mistaken identity, a hapless local widow, a reckless wedding, a dim-witted teenage bride, and a twist of dumb luck that lands this once-respectable Southern family in court to brave an embarrassing trial for murder. It’s become the talk of Clay County. And the loose-tongued Edna Earle will tell you all about it. “The most revered figure in contemporary American letters,” said the New York Times of Eudora Welty, which also hailed The Ponder Heart—a winner of the William Dean Howells Medal which was adapted into both a Broadway play and a PBS Masterpiece series—as “Miss Welty at her comic, compassionate best.”

Just Fly Away

Just Fly Away PDF Author: Andrew McCarthy
Publisher: Algonquin Books
ISBN: 1616206292
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 271

Get Book Here

Book Description
Fifteen-year-old Lucy Willows discovers that her father had an illegitimate child, now an eight-year-old boy who lives in the same town, and she begins to question everything she thought she knew about her family and life.

The Origin of Birds in the Footprints of Writing

The Origin of Birds in the Footprints of Writing PDF Author: Raymond St. Elmo
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781520490410
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 385

Get Book Here

Book Description
Clarence St. Claire is a programmer who cherishes an orderly life. His motto: 'work is important; people, not so much'. His determination to be The Most Serious Person on the Planet is threatened when he becomes haunted by a mysterious manuscript from his past: 300 pages of possibly random bird tracks. Risking his career and self-possession, St. Claire dares to pursue the manuscript against the opposition of hackers, the NSA, the ghosts of famous writers and doubts of his own sanity. Lost in a maze of bird-prints and their possible meanings, St. Claire determines to summon the late writer Jorge Louis Borges to help with the translation. He will dream Borges into existence, exactly as Borges wrote of doing. But this act stirs the opposition of a secret order of past writers, who may, possibly, have their own agenda. The duel between St. Claire's reality and theirs leads to a final encounter in The Dark Library, before the dread conclave known as The Tribunal of Dreams. 'Origins' is a book about books, about magic realism and artificial intelligence, virtual reality and languages, and how sensible people wind up in strange situations by strangely sensible steps. It is built of the words books whisper to each other alone after the library has closed. It ends as it must: with the hero tossed into a pit by Edgar Alan Poe. Kidding. I mean, that last does happen but the final ending is the hero finding the answer and getting the girl, as well as his sanity back. Mostly back. From the book: I sat on the bed in the dark, my back to the wall. I began a new web page. Time to tell the world the truth, I thought, and felt a surge of pride. This would upset the Secret Powers of the world. But hey they had cost me my $400 security deposit. It was payback time. I would tell the world. But tell what? I typed out the flat truth to see how it looked. There is a secret society of dead writers who live in the wall spaces between realities, in the silence of empty rooms, in the Schrödinger-uncertainty of unopened books. They call themselves the Tribunal of Dreams. Often they appear as birds. They peek out of mirrors and walk the shadows of libraries. They are old and sly and are not retired. They have vast plans. They have me barricaded in my bedroom and they painted my windows black. They are listening at the door now. Send help. I read it over several times. It expressed all the facts nicely, yet it lacked something. Specifically, it lacked the power to convince the world of anything except that I was insane.

Beulah

Beulah PDF Author: Augusta Jane Evans
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 518

Get Book Here

Book Description


Brat

Brat PDF Author: Andrew McCarthy
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
ISBN: 1538754282
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 209

Get Book Here

Book Description
Fans of Patti Smith's Just Kids and Rob Lowe's Stories I Only Tell My Friends will love this beautifully written, entertaining, and emotionally honest memoir by an actor, director, and author who found his start as an 80s Brat pack member -- the inspiration for the Hulu documentary Brats, written and directed by Andrew McCarthy. Most people know Andrew McCarthy from his movie roles in Pretty in Pink, St. Elmo's Fire, Weekend at Bernie's, and Less than Zero, and as a charter member of Hollywood's Brat Pack. That iconic group of ingenues and heartthrobs included Rob Lowe, Molly Ringwald, Emilio Estevez, and Demi Moore, and has come to represent both a genre of film and an era of pop culture. In his memoir Brat: An '80s Story, McCarthy focuses his gaze on that singular moment in time. The result is a revealing look at coming of age in a maelstrom, reckoning with conflicted ambition, innocence, addiction, and masculinity. New York City of the 1980s is brought to vivid life in these pages, from scoring loose joints in Washington Square Park to skipping school in favor of the dark revival houses of the Village where he fell in love with the movies that would change his life. Filled with personal revelations of innocence lost to heady days in Hollywood with John Hughes and an iconic cast of characters, Brat is a surprising and intimate story of an outsider caught up in a most unwitting success.

Caveat

Caveat PDF Author: Laura Kalpakian
Publisher: Blair
ISBN:
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 280

Get Book Here

Book Description
Based loosely on historical events in California in 1916, CAVEAT tells the story of Hank Beecham, son of a dissolute Confederate veteran and embittered mother, snubbed by the townspeople of St. Elmo. Hank finds his calling as a rainmaker, saving St. Elmo from a serious drought. When the town doesn't pay him as promised, Hank returns eight years later to exact his revenge.