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American Literature — page 49
4,848 public-domain american literature books, summarised. Page 49 of 101.
Concerning Sally
William John Hopkins
A young woman navigates the quiet complexities of family duty and personal growth in a turn-of-the-century New England setting. This character-focused narrative explores the delicate balance between loyalty to one’s kin and the pursuit of individual agency.
The Crevice
Isabel Ostrander
A wealthy magnate dies in his armchair, leaving behind a daughter, a questionable will, and a web of financial deceit that only an expert investigator can unravel.
The Penance of Magdalena and Other Tales of the California Missions
J. Smeaton (Joseph Smeaton) Chase
These tales capture the faded grandeur and lingering mysteries of the Spanish missions, blending historical reverence with the intimate, often poignant lives of those who inhabited their shadows.
The Reporter Who Made Himself King
Richard Harding Davis
A young reporter journeys to a remote island to find a story, only to accidentally declare himself king and trigger an international incident he must then frantically document for the world.
The Wall Street Girl
Frederick Orin Bartlett
Don Pendleton, a young man of privilege, finds himself suddenly penniless, engaged to a woman who cannot conceive of life without wealth, and mentored by a stenographer who knows exactly what it costs to survive.
A story teller's story
Sherwood Anderson
The path of an American artist is often a lonely one, winding through the tension between a soul’s need for expression and the harsh, industrial demands of a country obsessed with growth.
Harriet and the Piper
Kathleen Thompson Norris
The shadow of a past secret haunts a woman finding her place in a wealthy household, where love and social duty collide in a high-stakes game of reputation.
Hey Rub-a-dub-dub: A Book of the Mystery and Wonder and Terror of Life
Theodore Dreiser
This collection of essays and dramatic sketches serves as a stark, uncompromising autopsy of the American soul at the dawn of the twentieth century. It peels back the thin veneer of national progress to reveal a chaotic, indifferent universe where traditional morality is less a guiding star than a fragile,…
His Own People
Booth Tarkington
A naive American traveler finds his romanticized dreams of European high society shattered by a group of sophisticated swindlers. This cautionary tale exposes the painful gap between a young man’s aspirational fantasies and the gritty reality of his own vulnerability.
Mrs. Leary's Cow: A Legend of Chicago
C. C. (Charles Cole) Hine
A satirical retelling of the Great Chicago Fire, this work uses a legendary bovine scapegoat to lampoon the panicked financial fallout and bureaucratic hypocrisy that followed the city’s destruction.
Strangers and Wayfarers
Sarah Orne Jewett
The lives of rural New Englanders—often overlooked, aging, and burdened by the quiet weight of the past—find their dignity and grace in these compassionate, observant vignettes.
Ten Nights in a Bar Room
T. S. (Timothy Shay) Arthur
A traveler arrives at a pristine village tavern, only to witness the quiet, systematic unraveling of a community seduced by drink. This stark narrative traces the path from initial prosperity to total moral and domestic ruin.
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 52, February, 1862: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics
Various
The national pulse of a country at war beats through these pages, capturing the urgency, artistic ambition, and moral fervor of a defining moment in American history.
The Last Ditch
Will Levington Comfort
A haunted American adrift in the East trades the wreckage of his past for a perilous spiritual quest, only to find that his most challenging mission is the love of a woman.
Through Swamp and Glade: A Tale of the Seminole War
Kirk Munroe
This historical novel dramatizes the harrowing experiences of the Seminole people during the Second Seminole War, centering on the perspective of the young warrior Coacoochee. It captures a defining era of American expansion through a lens of resistance, betrayal, and the profound tragedy of displacement.
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, Part 4
Mark Twain
A nineteenth-century engineer finds himself abruptly transported into the brutal, superstitious world of Camelot, where he attempts to dismantle the foundations of feudalism using the tools of modern industry.
A Cry in the Wilderness
Mary E. (Mary Ella) Waller
A young woman flees the suffocating pressures of New York City to find a new life in the Canadian wilderness, where she must confront the heavy, inherited ghosts of her mother’s past.
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, Vol. 2. No. 17, February, 1921: America's Magazine of Wit, Humor and Filosophy
Various
This collection of early twentieth-century American humor captures the irreverent, restless spirit of the post-World War I era. Through a mix of short jokes, cynical verse, and observational commentary, it offers a distinct, unfiltered look at the preoccupations of the 1920s.
Drift from Two Shores
Bret Harte
These diverse sketches and stories capture the fractured, wandering soul of the American West. Through eccentric characters and shifting landscapes, they reveal a world defined by its transient arrivals and departures.
Fore!
Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan
A dedicated golfer is someone who has made his peace with the red-hot adjectives and the inevitable heartbreak of the fairways. These stories offer a sharp, knowing look at the people who populate the world of the club.
From the Easy Chair, Volume 1
George William Curtis
The perspective of an observant, mid-nineteenth-century gentleman offers a window into the shifting social habits, cultural milestones, and civic anxieties of a nation navigating its own adolescence.
Mind Amongst the Spindles. A Miscellany, Wholly Composed by the Factory Girls
Unknown
These voices emerged from the deafening machinery of mid-nineteenth-century Massachusetts, proving that the mind could flourish even amidst the relentless rhythm of the spinning jenny. They offer a rare, unmediated glimpse into the intellectual lives of women who were far more than the sum of their labor.
Rockhaven
Charles Clark Munn
A young man is sent to a remote island to manage a quarry, only to discover that his employer’s business is a calculated swindle designed to defraud the innocent.
Sense from Thought Divide
Mark Clifton
A personnel director at a research firm attempts to bridge the gap between hard-nosed science and the unexplainable phenomena of the human mind. He must solve the mystery of "poltergeist" effects to unlock the potential of new technology.
Six Girls and Bob: A Story of Patty-Pans and Green Fields
Marion Ames Taggart
A spirited family of sisters moves from a cramped city flat to a country farmhouse, discovering that true home-making relies on resilience, humor, and the unexpected kindness of neighbors.
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 71, September, 1863: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics
Various
This collection captures the urgent pulse of the American Civil War era, weaving together reports from the front, literary biography, and the deep, abiding anxieties of a nation in transition.
The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862: Devoted to Literature and National Policy
Various
The September 1862 issue of The Continental Monthly serves as a vibrant, urgent time capsule from the height of the American Civil War. It captures a nation in the throes of a profound moral and political identity crisis.
The ghosts of their ancestors
Weymer Jay Mills
A young woman’s forbidden romance with a lowly organist triggers a haunting, as the long-dead, status-obsessed Knickerbocker ancestors return to dismantle their descendants’ hollow pride.
The Good Gray Poet, A Vindication
William Douglas O'Connor
A passionate defense of a poet’s character and right to free expression, written in the wake of his dismissal from a government clerkship for his controversial writings.
The Knickerbocker, Vol. 10, No. 1, July 1837
Various
The July 1837 issue of The Knickerbocker serves as a vibrant time capsule, capturing the literary anxieties, intellectual curiosities, and aesthetic preoccupations of a nation still defining its cultural identity.
The Missing Bride
Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
A long-lost bride returns, but the shadow of a brutal crime haunts the reunion. A web of secrets and shifting identities binds the innocent to the guilty, until a final, shattering truth is brought to light.
The Real Man
Francis Lynde
A bank clerk escapes a corporate conspiracy to reinvent himself in the rugged West, only to find that his true battle lies in overcoming his own long-dormant, untamed nature.
Opinions
Claude C. (Claude Carlos) Washburn
Opinions are troublesome things, yet they possess a life of their own. Unburdening oneself of them through the act of writing becomes a necessary release, much like clearing sediment from a pipe.
She Would Be a Soldier
M. M. (Mordecai Manuel) Noah
A young woman disguises herself as a soldier to escape an arranged marriage, only to find herself facing a firing squad on the front lines of the War of 1812.
Sketches from Concord and Appledore: Concord thirty years ago
Frank Preston Stearns
A personal window into the intellectual life of nineteenth-century New England, this collection captures the fading echoes of a remarkable literary circle.
Stories of Exile
Unknown
Displaced souls wander through landscapes both real and imagined, searching for home while defined by the heavy weight of their separation.
The Heart of Rachael
Kathleen Thompson Norris
The pursuit of personal happiness often masks a deeper, more destructive restlessness. This story examines the high cost of choosing individual fulfillment over the enduring, complex obligations of marriage.
The Imported Bridegroom, and Other Stories of the New York Ghetto
Abraham Cahan
These stories map the collision between Old World piety and the raw, transformative energy of the New York immigrant experience. They capture the intimate friction of lives caught between tradition and modern American independence.
The Miraculous Pitcher: (From: "A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys")
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Two humble villagers discover that a simple act of kindness toward disguised gods can transform their world and secure their legacy forever. This retelling of a classic myth balances wonder with a gentle moral lesson on the virtue of hospitality.
Three Heroines of New England Romance: Their true stories herein set forth by Mrs Harriet Spoffard, Miss Louise Imogen Guiney, and Miss Alice Brown
Alice Brown
This collection of true histories excavates the lives of three legendary women, blending folklore with historical research to reveal the human stories beneath the polished myths of New England’s past.
Westways: A Village Chronicle
S. Weir (Silas Weir) Mitchell
A village in Pennsylvania becomes a microcosm of a nation divided, as the lives of its inhabitants are irrevocably altered by the gathering storm of the American Civil War.
Bamboo Tales
Ira L. (Ira Louis) Reeves
These sketches of military life capture the frantic, brutal, and often absurd reality of the American occupation of the Philippines at the turn of the twentieth century.
Betsy Gaskins (Dimicrat), Wife of Jobe Gaskins (Republican)
W. I. (William I.) Hood
A cautionary tale of rural hardship in the 1890s, this work blends domestic fiction with a polemical defense of Populist economic theories, centering on a couple caught in the tightening grip of a national financial crisis.
Brother Against Brother
John R. (John Roy) Musick
The tragedy of a family divided by the American Civil War serves as the backdrop for a tale of reconciliation, proving that even the deepest political fissures can be bridged by human affection and shared history.
Dyke Darrel the Railroad Detective
A. Frank Pinkerton
The exploits of a celebrated railway detective unfold in this vintage thriller, a breathless race against time featuring train robberies, underground prisons, and a calculated quest for vengeance.
Evelyn Byrd
George Cary Eggleston
A portrait of resilience during the final, desperate years of the Civil War, this narrative centers on the quiet courage of those who held their ground when victory had become an impossibility.
False Dawn (The 'Forties)
Edith Wharton
A young man stakes his future on a collection of radical art, only to be disowned by a father who cannot see the genius hidden beneath the dust. This is a story of vision, inheritance, and the tragic irony of timing.
John Stevens' Courtship: A Story of the Echo Canyon War
Susa Young Gates
HOOK Set against the backdrop of the 1857 Utah Expedition, this romance follows a stoic frontiersman and his spirited beloved as they navigate the peril and sacrifice of pioneer life.