Classics bestsellers

Atlas Shrugged is the “second most influential book for Americans today” after the Bible, according to a joint survey of five thousand people conducted by the Library of Congress and the Book of the Month Club in 1991.

In a scrap heap within an abandoned factory, the greatest invention in history lies dormant and unused. By what fatal error of... Read more »

In this sequel to the bestselling Mythos, legendary author and actor Stephen Fry moves from the exploits of the Olympian gods to the deeds of mortal heroes.

Perseus. Jason. Atalanta. Theseus. Heracles. Rediscover the thrills, grandeur, and unabashed fun of the Greek myths. Whether recounting a tender love affair or a heroic triumph, Fry deftly... Read more »

The classic Gothic suspense novel by Daphne du Maurier -- winner of the Anthony Award for Best Novel of the Century -- is now a Netflix film starring Lily James and Armie Hammer. 

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again . . .

The novel begins in Monte Carlo, where our heroine is swept off her feet by the dashing widower Maxim de Winter and... Read more »

Blackstone Audio presents a new recording of this immensely popular book.

George Orwell depicts a gray, totalitarian world dominated by Big Brother and its vast network of agents, including the Thought Police, a world in which news is manufactured according to the authorities’ will and people live tepid lives by rote.

Winston Smith, the hero with... Read more »

The masterpiece of Steinbeck’s later years, East of Eden is a sprawling epic in which Steinbeck created his most mesmerizing characters and explored his most enduring themes: the mystery of identity, the inexplicability of love, and the murderous consequences of love’s absence. Read more »

The Odyssey is literature's grandest evocation of every man's journey through life. In the myths and legends that are retold here, the energy and poetry of Homer's original is captured in a bold, contemporary idiom, giving us an edition of The Odyssey that is a joy to listen to, worth savoring treasuring for its sheer lyrical mastery. This... Read more »

From the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, here is the universally acclaimed novel—winner of the Booker Prize and the basis for an award-winning film.
 
This is Kazuo Ishiguro's profoundly compelling portrait of Stevens, the perfect butler, and of his fading, insular world in post-World War II England. Stevens, at the end of three... Read more »

Mansfield Park is the third published novel by Jane Austen, first published in 1814.

The novel tells the story of Fanny Price, starting when her overburdened family sends her at age ten to live in the household of her wealthy aunt and uncle and following her development into early adulthood. From early on critical interpretation has been diverse,... Read more »

Often called the greatest novel ever written, War and Peace is at once a historical war epic, a philosophical study, and a celebration of the Russian spirit. Noted for its mastery of realistic detail and psychological analysis, it follows the metamorphosis of five aristocratic families against the backdrop of the Napoleonic wars. Individual... Read more »

Originally published in 1932, this outstanding work of literature is more crucial and relevant today than ever before. Cloning, feel-good drugs, antiaging programs, and total social control through politics, programming, and media—has Aldous Huxley accurately predicted our future? With a storyteller’s genius, he weaves these ethical... Read more »

Little Women is one of the best loved books of all time. Lovely Meg, talented Jo, frail Beth, spoiled Amy: these are hard lessons of poverty and of growing up in New England during the Civil War. Through their dreams, plays, pranks, letters, illnesses, and courtships, women of all ages have become a part of this remarkable family and have felt... Read more »

Wallace Stegner’s uniquely American classic centers on Lyman Ward, a noted historian, who relates a fictionalized biography of his pioneer grandparents at a time when he has become estranged from his own family. Through a combination of research, memory, and exaggeration, Ward voices ideas concerning the relationship between history and the... Read more »

Tautly narrated and excruciatingly suspenseful, Double Indemnity gives us an X-ray view of guilt, of duplicity, and of the kind of obsessive, loveless love that devastates everything it touches. First published in 1936, this novel reaffirmed James M. Cain as a virtuoso of the roman noir.

Performed by James Naughton Read more »

The young poet Stephen has been recalled from Paris to Dublin to be at his mother's deathbed. But he refuses her dying wishes: to kneel and pray for her. Now, holed up in his Martello tower outside the city walls, he has to suffer the taunts of Buck Mulligan by day and, by night, the vision of 'her eyes, shaking out of death to shake and bend my... Read more »

Atlas Shrugged is the “second most influential book for Americans today” after the Bible, according to a joint survey of five thousand people conducted by the Library of Congress and the Book of the Month Club in 1991.

In a scrap heap within an abandoned factory, the greatest invention in history lies dormant and unused. By what fatal error of... Read more »

Charlotte Brontë’s most beloved novel describes the passionate love between the courageous orphan Jane Eyre and the brilliant, brooding, and domineering Rochester. The loneliness and cruelty of Jane’s childhood strengthens her natural independence and spirit, which prove invaluable when she takes a position as a governess at Thornfield Hall.... Read more »

A landmark new translation of a Calvino classic, a whimsical, spirited novel that imagines a life lived entirely on its own terms Cosimo di Rondo, a young Italian nobleman of the eighteenth century, rebels against his parents by climbing into the trees and remaining there for the rest of his life. He adapts efficiently to an existence in the... Read more »

Kazuo Ishiguro's Booker Prize-winning masterpiece became an international bestseller on publication, was adapted into an award-winning film, and has since come to be regarded as a modern classic.
 
The Remains of the Day is a spellbinding portrayal of a vanished way of life and a haunting meditation on the high cost of duty. It is also one of the... Read more »

Considered to be one of Virginia Woolf's most popular novels, Mrs. Dalloway follows one high-society woman as she goes about her day planning a splendid party for her acquaintances. As she goes about her day, she ponders on the life she could be living had she not married the reliable Richard Dalloway, and instead sought the enigmatic Peter... Read more »

Opening with the poem that made Poe a household name overnight, this collection of his short works includes the narrative poem "The Raven", the short story "The Fall of the House of Usher", and the first of Poe's "ratiocination" tales: "The Murders in the Rue Morgue", featuring the first of the fictional detectives: C. Auguste Dupin. From there... Read more »

Saul Bellow evokes all the rich colors and exotic customs of a highly imaginary Africa in this acclaimed comic novel about a middle-aged American millionaire who, seeking a new, more rewarding life, descends upon an African tribe. Henderson's awesome feats of strength and his unbridled passion for life win him the admiration of the tribe-but it... Read more »

"Ivanhoe" is a historical novel by Sir Walter Scott, part of the Waverley series. The action takes place during the 12th century in England, and the themes revolve mainly around chivalric romances, tournaments, trials, and religious clashes. It is the story of Sir Wilfred of Ivanhoe who is disinherited by his father for supporting the Norman... Read more »

Harry Houdini's greatest escape ever. While visiting Cairo as a tourist, Houdini and his wife are shown around the pyramids by a mysterious and slightly sinister guide who has a strange hollow voice and looks like an old pharaoh.

What starts as a strange traveller's adventure to witness a duel at midnight on the summit of one of the pyramids,... Read more »

"Narrator JD Jackson addresses his listener as "bro" in this decidedly contemporary retelling of the classic saga...His brilliant performance captures all the artistry, wit, and immediacy of this fresh translation, and breathes new life into what for most has been a literary fossil." -- AudioFile Magazine, Earphones Award winner

A new,... Read more »

This audiobook contains the complete novels of Jane Austen in the chronological order of their original publication. - Lady Susan (starts at Chapter 1) - Sense and Sensibility (starts at Chapter 44) - Pride and Prejudice (starts at Chapter 96) - Mansfield Park (starts at Chapter 159) - Emma (starts at Chapter 209) - Persuasion (starts at... Read more »

Voted America's Best-Loved Novel in PBS's The Great American Read

Harper Lee's Pulitzer Prize-winning masterwork of honor and injustice in the deep South—and the heroism of one man in the face of blind and violent hatred

One of the most cherished stories of all time, To Kill a Mockingbird has been translated into more than forty languages, sold... Read more »

First published in 1929, Passing is a remarkable exploration of the shifting racial and sexual boundaries in America. Larsen, a premier writer of the Harlem Renaissance, captures the rewards and dangers faced by two negro women who pass for white in a deeply segregated world. Read more »

James Baldwin’s stunning first novel is now an American classic. With startling realism that brings Harlem and the black experience vividly to life, this is a work that touches the heart with emotion while it stimulates the mind with its narrative style, symbolism, and excoriating vision of racism in America. Moving through time from the rural... Read more »

The original American full dramatization as broadcast on National Public Radio.

Bilbo Baggins, a gentle hobbit who loves the comforts of home, reluctantly joins a company of dwarves on a journey to recover plundered gold from a fierce dragon. It's a tale of high adventure and astonishing courage—and a magical prelude to the Lord of the Rings... Read more »

One of the great classics of world literature and the inspiration for the most beloved stage musical of all time, Les MisErables is legendary author Victor Hugo's masterpiece. This extraordinary English version by renowned translator Julie Rose captures all the majesty and brilliance of Hugo's work. Here is the timeless story of the... Read more »

Six children - Bernard, Susan, Rhoda, Neville, Jinny and Louis - meet in a garden close to the sea, their voices sounding over the constant echo of the waves that roll back and forth from the shore. The book follows them as they develop from childhood to maturity and follow different passions and ambitions; their voices are interspersed with... Read more »

This special unabridged, multivoiced production of Mary Shelley’s masterpiece of nineteenth-century Gothic horror is narrated by film and television star Anthony Heald, joined by Grammy winner Stefan Rudnicki and actor Simon Templeman, under the direction of award-winning audio producer Yuri Rasovsky.

Dr. Victor Frankenstein, an ambitious young... Read more »

John Steinbeck's powerful evocation of the suffering and hardship caused by the Great Depression, and a panoramic vision of the struggle for the American Dream, The Grapes of Wrath includes a critical introduction by Robert DeMott in Penguin Modern Classics. 'I've done my damndest to rip a reader's nerves to rags, I don't want him satisfied.'... Read more »

Don Quixote is the classic story. Called the first modern novel, this marvelous book has stood the test of time to become irrevocably intertwined with the fabric of society. Sixteenth-century Spanish gentleman Don Quixote, fed by his own delusional fantasies, takes to the road in search of chivalrous adventures. But his quest leads to more... Read more »

In this honest and stunning novel, James Baldwin has given America a moving story of love in the face of injustice. Told through the eyes of Tish, a nineteen-year-old girl in love with Fonny, a young sculptor who is the father of her child, Baldwin’s story mixes the sweet and the sad.Tish and Fonny have pledged to get married, but Fonny is... Read more »

The year is 1922, and young Nick Carraway moves to the village of West Egg, where he discovers that his neighbor is the eclectic millionaire Jay Gatsby. As he and Gatsby become acquainted, Nick is thrown into a world full of dazzling parties, unrequited love, and unchecked idealism. Gatsby, surrounded by riches, yearns for the love of a woman... Read more »

In this brilliant conclusion to his bestselling Mythos trilogy, legendary author and actor Stephen Fry retells the tale of the Trojan War.

Full of tragic heroes, intoxicating love stories, and the unstoppable force of fate, there is no conflict more iconic than the Trojan War. Troy is the story of the epic battle retold by Fry with drama, humor,... Read more »

Set in the 1950s Paris of American expatriates, liaisons, and violence, a young man finds himself caught between desire and conventional morality.

With a sharp, probing imagination, James Baldwin’s now-classic narrative delves into the mystery of loving and creates a moving, highly controversial story of death and passion that reveals the... Read more »

Rebecca: Booktrack Edition adds an immersive musical soundtrack to your audiobook listening experience! *
Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again . . .

The novel begins in Monte Carlo, where our heroine is swept off her feet by the dashing widower Maxim de Winter and his sudden proposal of marriage. Orphaned and working as a lady's maid,... Read more »

The provincial Bennet family, home to five unmarried daughters, is turned upside down when a wealthy bachelor takes up a house nearby. Mr. Bingley enhances his instant popularity by hosting a ball and taking an interest in the eldest Bennet daughter, Jane. Meanwhile, Mr. Darcy, Bingley’s even wealthier friend, makes himself equally unpopular by... Read more »

A fiftieth-anniversary edition of Ken Kesey's searing American classic.

Boisterous, ribald, and ultimately shattering, Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest has left an indelible mark on the literature of our time. Turning conventional notions of sanity and insanity on their heads, the novel tells the unforgettable story of a mental... Read more »

Shirley Jackson’s deliciously unsettling novel about a perverse, isolated, and possibly murderous family takes readers deep into a labyrinth of dark neurosis, macabre humor, and gothic atmosphere.

Six years after four family members died suspiciously of arsenic poisoning, the three remaining Blackwoods—elder, agoraphobic sister Constance;... Read more »

In a poor, remote section of southern Mexico, the Red Shirts have taken control. God has been outlawed, and the priests have been systematically hunted down and killed. Now, the last priest strives to overcome physical and moral cowardice in order to find redemption.

Graham Greene explores corruption and atonement in this penetrating novel set in... Read more »

Victor Frankenstein is a young scientist who artificially creates a human being. His expectations are however far from reality as is Creation is so monstrous that it cannot fit into human society. This leads to dreadful consequences as the monster decides to take it revenge his creator. Will Frankenstein manage to control his creature or will he... Read more »

Edmond Dantes is falsely accused of treason on the day of his marriage. He is directly imprisoned in the fortress of If without any investigations being conducted. Edmond does not give up and he is determined to find his way out. The endpoint is the Isle of Monte Cristo which hides a great fortune. Will Dantes free himself from the imprisonment?... Read more »

An undisputed masterpiece of twentieth-century literature, perfect for Fitzgerald lovers and classics collectors alike.

Set against a backdrop of jazz music, bootlegging, and lavish parties, The Great Gatsby is the story of Midwesterner Nick Carraway’s curious introduction to the decadent world of his mysterious, wealthy neighbor Jay Gatsby,... Read more »

Now an HBO Film!

“If one had to identify the single most influential shaping force in modern Black literary history, one would probably have to point to Wright and the publication of Native Son.” – Henry Louis Gates Jr.

Right from the start, Bigger Thomas had been headed for jail. It could have been for assault or petty larceny; by chance, it was... Read more »

Murasaki Shikibu, born into the middle ranks of the aristocracy during the Heian period (794–1185 CE), wrote The Tale of Genji―widely considered the world’s first novel―during the early years of the eleventh century. Expansive, compelling, and sophisticated in its representation of ethical concerns and aesthetic ideals, Murasaki’s tale came to... Read more »

Loosely based on sensational press reports of a Moscow student’s murder by fellow revolutionists, The Possessed depicts the destructive chaos caused by outside agitators who move into a provincial town. The enigmatic and ideological Stavrogin dominates the novel, his magnetic personality influencing his tutor, the liberal intellectual poseur... Read more »