Marriage
"It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages," said philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. The texts in this collection depict happy and unhappy marriages—and those that fall somewhere in between.
1st to Die (2001), by bestselling author James Patterson, is the first novel in The Women’s Murder Club series. The club features four friends—San Francisco homicide detective Lindsay Boxer, medical examiner Claire Washburn, crime reporter Cindy Thomas, and assistant district attorney Jill Bernhardt—who work together, both professionally and personally, to solve crimes. In this first novel, the club works to solve the Honeymoon Murders, the killing of three couples just after their weddings. 1st to... Read 1st to Die Summary
Written in 2017 by Ken Follett, A Column of Fire is a historical fiction novel and the third book in his Kingsbridge series, following The Pillars of the Earth (1989) and World Without End (2007). This novel is a loose sequel to the previous two books and is set against the backdrop of 16th-century Europe. Spanning both decades and continents, it follows the lives of a cast of characters who are caught in the conflict... Read A Column of Fire Summary
A Doll’s House is a modern tragedy released in 1879 by Norwegian writer Henrik Ibsen. Composed of three acts, the play is set in a Norwegian town of the author’s present day and mainly concerns Nora and Torvald Helmer, whose marriage implodes under the weight of Nora’s emotional, social, and political subjugation by Europe’s regressive gender norms. The play is well known for exploring the married woman’s bleak plight in a world dominated by men... Read A Doll's House Summary
A Game of Thrones is a 1996 epic fantasy novel by George R. R. Martin and is the first in his long-running A Song of Ice and Fire series. The novel introduces the audience to the fictional world of Westeros, where characters become embroiled in a complicated web of plots, conspiracies, and betrayals as they pursue power. A Game of Thrones won numerous awards on publication and was adapted for television in 2011. This guide... Read A Game of Thrones Summary
Agnes Grey is the first novel by Anne Brontë (1820-1849), the youngest of the three celebrated Brontë sisters, who all wrote novels now considered classics of English literature. Anne drew on her experience as a clergyman’s daughter and as a governess in telling the story of a young woman looking for her place in the world. Published in 1847 under the pseudonym Acton Bell, Agnes Grey was read as an incisive commentary on the status... Read Agnes Grey Summary
A House for Mr. Biswas is a 1961 novel by V. S. Naipaul. The story takes a postcolonial perspective of the life of a Hindu Indian man in British-owned and occupied Trinidad. Now regarded as one of Naipaul's most significant novels, A House for Mr. Biswas has won numerous awards and has been adapted as a musical, a radio drama, and a television show. This guide is written using an eBook version of the 2001... Read A House for Mr. Biswas Summary
A is for Alibi (1982), written by Sue Grafton, is the first book in the Alphabet Mysteries series, featuring private investigator Kinsey Millhone. In the novel, Millhone, a former police officer, is hired by a woman who claims she was wrongfully convicted eight years ago of murdering her cheating husband. The Alphabet Mysteries series redefined the role of women detectives in 20th-century literature. The novel is a police procedural that touches on themes such as... Read A Is For Alibi Summary
All’s Well That Ends Well is a play by William Shakespeare (1582-1616), one of the most influential writers in the English language. The date of composition is not known, but All’s Well That Ends Well was first performed between 1598 and 1608. It was published in 1623, in the First Folio. Shakespeare’s work is part of Early Modern English literature, alongside playwrights like Ben Jonson and Christopher Marlowe, during which time the play and theater... Read All's Well That Ends Well Summary
A Month in the Country is a fiction novel published in 1980 by the British author J.L. Carr, a retired schoolteacher and publisher. The novel tells the deceptively spare tale of Thomas Birkin, a veteran of World War One who, having just returned from overseas, accepts summer employment to restore a mural. Dating back nearly five centuries, the mural adorns the wall of an old country church in northern England. During the weeks he painstakingly... Read A Month in the Country Summary
Published in 1925, Theodore Dreiser’s realist novel An American Tragedy is one of the author’s most critically acclaimed works. Set in the 1920s in Kansas City, Chicago, and small-town New York state, the novel is the story of how Clyde Griffiths, the son of poor, itinerant preachers, kills Roberta Alden during a boat trip in the Adirondack Mountains.This guide is based on the Kindle edition published by Rosetta Books.Content Warning: This novel contains racist slurs... Read An American Tragedy Summary
Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman’s "A New England Nun" was first published in 1891's A New England Nun and Other Stories. The collection exhibits the author’s many modes of writing, demonstrating her mastery of the Romantic, Gothic, and psychologically symbolic genres. The stories focus on the native scenery, dialogue, landscape, and values of 19th-century New England. The stories center on themes of women’s integrity and hardships, femininity versus masculinity, and the commerce and culture of the... Read A New England Nun Summary
Anna Karenina is Leo Tolstoy’s second novel, following War and Peace (1869). Serially published in 1877, Anna Karenina depicts the efforts of its titular character to escape an unhappy marriage to her older, civil servant husband and pursue a love affair with a young and dashing count, Alexei Vronsky. The novel is a sweeping family drama exploring Tolstoy’s interest in marriage, family, agrarian politics, and gender roles. The work is also a portrait of Russian... Read Anna Karenina Summary
“A Perfect Day for Bananafish” is a short story by iconic American author J. D. Salinger. First published in The New Yorker in 1948 and later published in the collection Nine Stories (1953), it is considered one of Salinger’s breakthrough works, establishing the unique voice, flair for character, energetic dialogue, and inventive style that would become his trademarks. The story centers on a young New York City couple, Seymour and Muriel Glass, and the bizarre... Read A Perfect Day for Bananafish Summary
A Room with a View is a 1908 novel by British author E. M. Forster. The novel is split between Italy and England, telling the story of Lucy Honeychurch, a young and spirited middle-class Englishwoman who embarks on a journey of self-discovery during a trip to Italy. During her travels, Lucy falls in love with the free-spirited and unconventional George Emerson, a fellow tourist, but is later forced to choose between her heart's desire and... Read A Room with a View Summary
Sheldon Vanauken’s celebrated memoir A Severe Mercy is a moving portrait of deep love confronted with suffering and death. Published in 1977, A Severe Mercy was written by Vanauken from the compilation of many years’ worth of journal entries, hand-written letters, and firsthand accounts of the people and events that the narrative relates. As a Yale- and Oxford-trained scholar and professor of English and an accomplished poet and author, Vanauken brings his literary expertise to... Read A Severe Mercy Summary
“A Sorrowful Woman” is Gail Godwin’s most anthologized short story and tackles the themes of depression, domesticity, and female identity. Godwin is a best-selling American author and multiple National Book Award finalist who often explores these themes in her novels. “A Sorrowful Woman,” a subversion of the fairy tale, details a woman’s struggles with her role as wife and mother and the expectations and disappointments that lead her to suicide. Godwin’s unnamed characters upend the... Read A Sorrowful Woman Summary
“A Temporary Matter” by American author Jhumpa Lahiri was originally published in the New Yorker in 1998. Published in 1999, Lahiri’s Pulitzer Prize-winning debut short story collection Interpreter of Maladies opens with “A Temporary Matter.” The story follows Shoba and Shukumar, an Indian American married couple in their thirties, as they reconnect for one hour each evening during a planned electricity outage. Over the course of five nights, Shoba and Shukumar explore the complexities of... Read A Temporary Matter Summary
Beauty and the Beast by Gabrielle-Suzanna Barbot De Villeneuve first appeared in her collection of fairy tales La jeune américaine, et les contes marins (The Young American and Marine Tales) in 1740 and was abridged into a Christian moral tale by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont in 1756. As a fairy-tale classic, Beauty and the Beast has been retold around the globe and in several mediums, including books, film, theater, and opera. The most well-known adaptations... Read Beauty and the Beast Summary
Behind Her Eyes, a psychological thriller, was written by Sarah Pinborough and published in 2017. The book has sold over 1 million copies worldwide and was adapted for a TV series by Netflix. While clearly a best seller, there is great divergence of opinion on the book’s very unexpected twist at the end, with the publishers using the hashtag #WTFThatEnding to promote the book.Plot SummaryLouise is a single mother living in London and working as... Read Behind Her Eyes Summary
Written by Irish novelist Maria Edgeworth (1768-1849) and published in 1801, Belinda remains one of the landmark works of the late Restoration novel and a precursor of the realistic novel of the mid-19th century. Its purpose is made clear by Edgeworth herself in a brief preface that begins the novel: “The following work is offered to the public as a Moral Tale” (1). Edgeworth was distressed by the glut of frivolous novels that sought only... Read Belinda Summary
“Big Blonde” is a short story written by Dorothy Parker. It was first published in 1929 in The Bookman (a prestigious New York City literary magazine) and won the O. Henry competition for the best story that same year. It was later published in Parker’s 1930 short-story collection Laments for the Living.This study guide refers to the online flipbook version of “Big Blonde.”Content Warning: The source text contains references to domestic violence, alcohol addiction, and... Read Big Blonde Summary
“Bliss” is a short story written by New Zealand author Katherine Mansfield. It was originally published in 1918 in The English Review and later republished in 1920 as a collection of short stories entitled Bliss and Other Stories. Katherine Mansfield was a contemporary of British writers such as Virginia Woolf, D. H. Lawrence, and James Joyce. As a Modernist story, “Bliss” focuses on the protagonist’s emotions and growing self-awareness, and Mansfield extensively uses stream of... Read Bliss Summary
Blithe Spirit is a 1941 farce written by the English playwright, composer, and actor Noël Coward. Known for his wit and style, Coward’s theatrical career lasted for nearly six decades. Blithe Spirit, one of his most popular and enduring works, was first performed in the West End, running for 1,997 performances, before transferring to Broadway for 657 performances. It was adapted into the musical High Spirits in 1964. To this day, the play continues to... Read Blithe Spirit Summary
Blood Wedding, a Spanish rural tragedy, was written by Federico Garcia Lorca in 1932 while he was director of the travelling theater company Teatro Universitario La Barraca. The play was first performed at Teatro Beatriz in Madrid in 1933 under the title Bodas de Sangre. It ran briefly in America on Broadway in 1935, where it was retitled Bitter Oleander. It was not well received; the passions and folkloric culture in the play were too... Read Blood Wedding Summary
“Blue Beard,” by 17th-century French author Charles Perrault, is a short story in the fairy tale genre that relies on symbolism and concision to address themes of Female Agency, Transgressive Knowledge, and Patriarchal Control. First published in Perrault’s 1697 book Histoires ou Contes du Temps passé, avec des Moralités (meaning Stories or Tales from Times Past, with Morals), “Blue Beard” was found alongside other classic fairy tales that engage with similar themes, such as “Sleeping... Read Bluebeard Summary
Bluebird, Bluebird (2017) by Texas native Attica Locke, published by Little, Brown and Company, is a 2018 Edgar and Anthony award-winning mystery novel. It was also selected as a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and Kirkus Best Mysteries and Thrillers of 2017. The first in the Highway 59 series follows Texas Ranger Darren Mathews through the backroads of Texas in search of justice and reform... Read Bluebird, Bluebird Summary
Bruiser by Neal Shusterman, first published in 2010, is a young adult novel. It explores the life of Brewster “Bruiser” Rawlins, a high school student who has the ability to take pain away from those he cares about. Through his supernatural ability, the novel explores themes of Finding Emotional Balance, The Complications of Empathy, and The Dangers of Excessive Dependence on Others. Shusterman is the author of dozens of young adult novels, short stories, and works... Read Bruiser Summary
Thomas Mann’s novel Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family was first published in 1901 and came to be recognized as a monumental work in the canon of modern literature. Thomas Mann (1875–1955) was a German novelist and recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1929 for his novels, Buddenbrooks and The Magic Mountain. Mann draws on his own family history to craft Buddenbrooks’ narrative, demonstrating profound understanding of societal and familial dynamics in the... Read Buddenbrooks Summary
“Cat in the Rain,” a short story by American author Ernest Hemingway, was first published in the 1925 collection In Our Time. Hemingway’s story, like much of his work, is semi-autobiographical and based on his experience as an expatriate in Europe after World War I. Hemingway and his first wife, Hadley, shared a love of cats, and it’s thought he wrote this story for her while they lived in Italy and France. The short story... Read Cat in the Rain Summary
Clock Dance (2018) is Anne Tyler’s 22nd domestic literary fiction novel that explores the smaller details of the human condition. Clock Dance, which spans time periods from 1967 to 2017, follows Willa, a woman who’s always made herself useful to those around her without any regard for her own needs. Through Willa’s life, Clock Dance explores themes of self-fulfillment, appreciation, passivity, and community to show how people do (or don’t) change throughout time. This novel... Read Clock Dance Summary
