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Penguin Little Black Classics: A Complete List

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Introducing Little Black Classics : 80 books for Penguin’s 80th birthday. Little Black Classics celebrate the huge range and diversity of Penguin Classics, with books from around the world and across many centuries. They take us from a balloon ride over Victorian London to a garden of blossom in Japan, from Tierra del Fuego to 16th-century California and the Russian steppe. Here are stories lyrical and savage; poems epic and intimate; essays satirical and inspirational; and ideas that have shaped the lives of millions. 1. Mrs Rosie and the Priest by Giovanni Boccaccio Four hilarious and provocative stories from Boccaccio’s Decameron, featuring cuckolded husbands, cross-dressing wives and very bad priests. 2. As Kingfishers Catch Fire by Gerard Manley Hopkins ‘O let them be left, wildness and wet’ As Kingfishers Catch Fire is a selection of Gerard Manley Hopkins’ incomparably brilliant poetry, ranging from the ecstasy of 'The Windhover’ and 'Pied Beauty’ to the heart-wrenching ...
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Girl in the Walls by A. J. Gnuse - Book Review

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I had expected Girl in the Walls to be a gothic thriller, perhaps with ghostly goings-on in the vein of Sarah Perry or Laura Purcell, and was very pleasantly surprised to discover this is a literary thriller, whose story leaps off the page and demands to be read to its conclusion. While reading, I could easily imagine this book in movie form.  Elise is a young orphan, returned to the house she considered her true home, though as another family now lives there, she survives by secreting herself in the walls.Her occupancy does not go wholly unnoticed: Eddie, the younger of two teenage boys, often thinks he sees someone from the corner of his eye. An awkward boy, he wonders if the presence is a figment of his overactive imagination. Until his boisterous older brother confesses that he's noticed things too.  I truly don't want to share any more of this fast-paced plot. Suffice to stay that events unfold which spiral out of control and put the lives of all the main protagonists in ...
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Earlier this year, I discovered the unexpected delight of Alix. E. Harrow’s Ten Thousand Doors of January (I muse upon that excellent title in the review post), so when I learned that this excellent word-mistress had another novel in progress, I was very excited to read it!Thanks to Netgalley, I was able to read a digital ARC of The Once and Future Witches , which I consider to be a glorious feminist approach to Witchcraft in literary form. The plot revolves around three sisters: James Juniper, Agnes Amaranth, and Beatrice Belladonna, who have - at different times in their lives - escaped their abusive father and drifted to the town of New Salem. Though at first, none of them are aware of their other sisters’ presence. An ominous magical occurrence draws them together, though at first the bond between them is frayed. Remembrance of their grandmother’s tales Witchcraft and the poetry of spells help fortify them - and their allies - against the oppressive dangers of the patriarchy and t...
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