The whole shelf
All free summaries — page 873
44,127 public-domain books, summarised. Page 873 of 920.
Two girls and a mystery
May Hollis Barton
When an ordinary teenager inherits a dilapidated estate, she finds herself caught in a web of ghostly noises, sinister strangers, and a hidden fortune waiting to be unearthed.
Uarda : a Romance of Ancient Egypt
Georg Ebers
Set during the reign of Rameses II, this historical novel weaves the lives of princes, priests, and outcasts into a tapestry of political intrigue and personal discovery. It remains a foundational work of Egyptological fiction, known for its meticulous attention to historical setting and the complexities of ancient…
Walled In: A True Story of Randall's Island
William O. Stoddard
A boy unjustly confined to a reformatory plans a daring escape, unaware that his path is destined to cross with an impoverished family struggling against their own metaphorical walls in the heart of New York.
Watch the Sky
James H. Schmitz
They thought they were fabricating an alien threat to line their pockets, until they discovered the lie they told was the terrifying truth.
Weymouth New Testament in Modern Speech, Revelation
Richard Francis Weymouth
A vision of cosmic upheaval and final restoration, this translation renders the ancient apocalypse into clear, accessible prose. It captures the urgent, sensory intensity of a prophecy that promises both destruction and a new beginning.
Whiffet Squirrel
Julia Greene
This is a charming, cautionary woodland tale about the dangers of vanity and the consequences of taking what does not belong to you.
Whistler Stories
Unknown
The sharpest tongue in the Victorian art world, this master of the stinging retort famously claimed he was not born, but came from on high.
A Bad Town for Spacemen
Robert Scott
A returning space traveler discovers that New York, once a welcoming haven, has turned bleak, hostile, and visibly decayed during his absence among the stars.
A Filbert Is a Nut
Rick Raphael
This story explores the absurdity of bureaucratic panic when confronted with the impossible. A confined, unassuming man discovers a way to manifest devastating technology from mundane materials, leaving authority figures trapped between their own skepticism and the terrifying reality of his success.
A Matter of Order
Fox B. Holden
The inhabitants of a distant colony realize that maintaining their own internal harmony requires them to occasionally manipulate the chaotic, war-torn civilization they left behind.
A Romany of the Snows, vol. 3: Being a Continuation of the Personal Histories of "Pierre and His People" and the Last Existing Records of Pretty Pierre
Gilbert Parker
HOOK The harsh, unforgiving wilderness of the Canadian North becomes a stage for the collision of human vanity, long-buried regrets, and the slow, grinding power of absolute isolation.
A Strange Story
Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron
This narrative explores the fragile boundary between the clinical rigor of science and the unmapped depths of the human spirit, following a man’s journey from intellectual arrogance to a humbled search for truth.
A Tourist Named Death
Christopher Anvil
An operative sent to an undeveloped planet discovers a rigid society governed by literal justice, where a hidden corporate conspiracy threatens to manipulate an interplanetary referendum.
Address, delivered in Craigie Hall, Edinburgh, February 24th, 1871
Josephine Elizabeth Grey Butler
A lone voice stands before a Scottish audience in 1871, rallying the public against a creeping legislative tyranny that strips vulnerable citizens of their constitutional rights under the guise of public health.
An Account of the Abipones, an Equestrian people of Paraguay, (3 of 3)
Unknown
Fearless horsemen cross broad rivers on foot, plunge into Spanish settlements, and vanish with herds of livestock into trackless wilderness.
An Answer to a scurrilous pamphlet, lately printed, intituled, A letter from Monsieur de Cros, to the Lord ----
William Temple
This polemical response defends a statesman’s memoirs against the distortions of a minor political operative, serving as a sharp, spirited critique of historical record and the nature of public reputation.
An apology for the study of northern antiquities
Elizabeth Elstob
Defending the historical roots of the English language, this spirited polemic challenges contemporary critics who dismissed Anglo-Saxon as a "barbarous" tongue unworthy of serious study.
An Eel by the Tail
Allen Kim Lang
A routine physics class turns absurd when an ambitious teacher's botched experiment summons a telepathic, shape-shifting alien from another galaxy into his high school classroom.
An Enquiry into the Truth of the Tradition, Concerning the Discovery of America, by Prince Madog ab Owen Gwynedd, about the Year, 1170
John Williams
The legend of a Welsh prince who reached the Americas three centuries before Columbus serves as the foundation for this historical inquiry, which attempts to reconcile ancient bardic tradition with eighteenth-century colonial records.
An experiment in gyro-hats
Ellis Parker Butler
A meticulous hatter seeks to cure a young suitor's mysterious, perpetual staggering through the application of a high-tech gyroscope hat.
An Old Sweetheart of Mine
James Whitcomb Riley
A quiet evening at home turns into a tender voyage through time as a man lights his pipe and lets memory summon his very first love.
And there was light
Lester Del Rey
The world is divided between two rival superpowers, and scientist Johann Volcek has invented a bloodless, sterilizing weapon to ensure his side's ultimate victory through patience rather than wholesale destruction.
Asneha, the legend of the opal
Carlo de Fornaro
A humble musician blessed by a golden bird receives a magic flute capable of enchanting mortals and gods alike, culminating in a celestial challenge that gives birth to the opal.
Birds Found on the Arctic Slope of Northern Alaska
James W. Bee
The treeless tundra of Alaska’s Arctic Slope provides a harsh, fleeting stage for a singular avian drama. This rigorous field report documents the survival, migration, and daily habits of dozens of bird species inhabiting this extreme frontier.
Brave and True: Short stories for children by G. M. Fenn and Others
George Manville Fenn
A lonely mining camp in the Rockies, a snowy school dormitory at Christmas, and the quiet riverbanks of the Home Counties frame this collection of moral tales.
Chain of Colonial Houses
Anonymous
Eight historic Philadelphia landmarks, preserved and restored through civic dedication, reveal the architectural evolution and domestic lives of early American generations along the Schuylkill River.
Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 460: Volume 18, New Series, October 23, 1852
Various
This collection of essays and reports from 1852 offers a panoramic view of Victorian curiosity, blending practical science, commercial caution, and international wonder.
Citadel of the Green Death
Robert Emmett McDowell
Condemned to a hellish alien world of sentient, carnivorous forests, an anti-social rebel must navigate deadly corporate politics and a planetary uprising to find genuine freedom.
Civil War Experiences, 1862-1865: Chickamauga, Mission Ridge, Buzzard Roost, Resaca, Rome, New Hope Church, Kenesaw Mountain, Peach Tree Creek, Atlanta, Jonesboro, Averysboro, Bentonville
Edward Mott Robbins
A veteran’s unvarnished account captures the grueling reality of a soldier’s life in the 78th Illinois Infantry, from the Mississippi River to the final, hard-won victory of the Grand Review.
Cows is cows
W. C. (Wilbur C.) Tuttle
When a Bible-spouting sower on a yellow burro and a laconic cow-country sheriff collide with fake detectives and petty brand-blinds, Montana justice gets wonderfully chaotic.
Daddy Joe's fiddle
Faith Bickford
A lonely, motherless girl finds solace and a secret voice in her late father’s treasured, forbidden violin.
Diary of Samuel Pepys
Samuel Pepys
A life lived in the margins of history, this record transforms the daily grind of a mid-level bureaucrat into an extraordinary, unvarnished window into the pulse of Restoration England.
Diary of Samuel Pepys
Samuel Pepys
The most intimate record of a life ever written, these pages capture the vibrant, messy pulse of 17th-century London through the eyes of a man obsessed with his own rise and the state of the world.
Donovan Pasha, and Some People of Egypt
Gilbert Parker
The desert hides secrets and fortunes alike, but in the shadow of the Nile, even the most reckless adventurer finds that the weight of the past is a debt that must eventually be paid.
Dorothy at Oak Knowe
Evelyn Raymond
When American teenager Dorothy Calvert arrives late to an elite Canadian boarding school, her impulsive warmth quickly shatters the rigid decorum of her new teachers and classmates.
Entertaining Made Easy
Emily Rose Burt
The secret to a successful gathering lies not in elaborate expense or hidden talents, but in the simple, thoughtful act of tailoring your entertainment to fit the specific people you have invited.
Fires of Driftwood
Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
A meditation on the persistence of memory and the transience of human endeavor, this collection of verse turns the debris of life into a light that illuminates the bridge between the everyday and the infinite.
Flames of the Storm
W. C. (Wilbur C.) Tuttle
In a drought-parched valley torn by war between cattlemen and sheep-herders, a lanky cowboy finds himself wrongly convicted of murder, setting off a storm of violence, loyalty, and redemption.
Frank Merriwell, Junior's, Golden Trail
Burt L. Standish
A group of quick-witted friends embarks on a high-stakes desert rescue to save a naive professor from ruthless claim-jumpers in the rugged Arizona territory.
Half-Hours with Great Story-Tellers: Artemus Ward, George Macdonald, Max Adeler, Samuel Lover, and Others
Various
A collection of nineteenth-century narratives blending the supernatural, the absurd, and the romantic, these stories offer a window into the varied ways writers of the era entertained their readers.
Harper's Round Table, August 13, 1895
Various
This edition of a long-running Victorian youth periodical serves as a vivid time capsule, capturing the restless, industrious, and patriotic spirit of late 19th-century boyhood through fiction, mechanical instruction, and social guidance.
Heart of Oak: A Three-Stranded Yarn, vol. 3
William Clark Russell
The ocean is a vast, indifferent stage where hope and despair collide; here, a determined man pursues a ghost across the icy fringes of the world to reclaim a life he thought lost.
Hemming, the adventurer
Theodore Goodridge Roberts
A restless English soldier of fortune navigates tropical revolutions, literary ambition, and a long-deferred romance across distant seas.
Heroes in Peace: The 6th William Penn Lecture, May 9, 1920
John Haynes Holmes
The traditional image of the hero is a soldier in uniform, yet true courage often manifests in the quiet, solitary, and unrewarded acts of ordinary life. This lecture redefines heroism by shifting the focus from the battlefield to the spirit.
Holes, Incorporated
L. Major Reynolds
Inventors are often told that ideas alone are not enough to succeed in business. This short story explores the volatile consequences of creating a revolutionary technology without the protection of a patent or the shield of legal savvy.
"How Can I Help to Abolish Slavery?" or, Counsels to the Newly Converted
Maria Weston Chapman
Standing on the threshold of a great moral struggle, a seasoned abolitionist offers uncompromising counsel to those eager to help eradicate human bondage.
Illustration of the Method of Recording Indian Languages: From the First Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, Smithsonian Institution
James Owen Dorsey
The rabbit captures the sun, a conjurer performs a secret rite, and a dog leads a pack of conspirators in a raid on a woman’s stores. These traditional tales and descriptions serve as a window into the linguistic landscape of North American tribes.
In the night
Gorell, Ronald Gorell Barnes, Baron
When a harsh, isolated country squire is found murdered in his own hall, a quiet English village becomes the stage for a tense puzzle of family secrets and amateur deduction.