Free summaries
American Literature — page 56
3,373 public-domain american literature books, summarised. Page 56 of 71.
The Golden Judge
Nathaniel Gordon
A flippant suggestion made during a sweltering UN armistice meeting unexpected transforms global diplomacy by proving that nations respect the outcome of a fair bet far more than formal treaties.
The Iron Woman
Margaret Wade Campbell Deland
Youth, passion, and stubborn pride collide in a industrial river town where four childhood friends discover how easily a single hasty decision can shatter multiple lives.
The Lucky Seventh
Ralph Henry Barbour
A makeshift ball club, a stubborn town patriarch, and a crippling injury conspire against a high school baseball team fighting to keep its home field.
The Pension Beaurepas
Henry James
An observant American student takes lodging in Geneva, where two expatriate families quietly unravel over money, culture, and the freedom to go home.
The Shagganappi
E. Pauline Johnson
Across these stories of the Canadian frontier, young hands hold canoes against furious rapids, skin frostbitten ankles on the trail, and balance the weight of ancestral honor against a rapidly encroaching white world.
A Man and a Woman
Stanley Waterloo
A boy rescues a nest of sparrows from a pair of black-snakes, grows into a timber-splitter with a penchant for knight-errantry, and eventually finds a companion who matches his restless, high-spirited mind.
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.
Anthology of Magazine Verse for 1913
Unknown
A year of verse published in American magazines moves from quiet personal reflection to the clamor of industrial towns and classical myth.
Aunt Crete's Emancipation
Grace Livingston Hill
A unappreciated, middle-aged maiden aunt receives an unexpected visit from her Western nephew, opening the door to an astonishing transformation.
Barriers Burned Away
Edward Payson Roe
In a city built on raw ambition, a proud artist and an earnest clerk find that their strongest prejudices cannot survive the flames that consume everything around them.
Bread
Charles G. (Charles Gilman) Norris
The working woman’s struggle for independence is a relentless, lifelong labor. This narrative follows a woman’s attempt to balance professional ambition with the demands of a traditional marriage, ultimately examining the cost of autonomy.
Cudjo's Cave
J. T. (John Townsend) Trowbridge
Caught in the fierce crossfire of the American Civil War in East Tennessee, an idealistic Quaker schoolmaster must choose between non-violent principles and the fight for human liberty against ruthless local secessionists.
Daddy Jake the Runaway, and Short Stories Told after Dark
Joel Chandler Harris
A runaway slave’s escape into a cypress swamp sparks a desperate river journey by two young children seeking to bring him safely home.
Elsie's Kith and Kin
Martha Finley
A young stepmother struggles to maintain peace in her home when her volatile stepdaughter’s sudden act of violence threatens to shatter the family.
Isabel Leicester
Maude Alma
Stripped of her fortune by her father’s death, a young Victorian woman enters domestic service as a governess, navigating spiteful relatives, romantic entanglements, and her own bruised pride.
Lemorne Versus Huell
Elizabeth Stoddard
A suppressed music teacher is drawn into an unsettling romance with her formidable aunt’s opposing legal counsel during a tense summer resort stay.
Nobody
Susan Warner
A quiet country girl’s modest principles disrupt the artificial boundaries of New York high society when a wealthy bachelor falls in love with her unpretentious heart.
Pippin
Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
A young man leaves prison determined to repay his debt to society, wandering the New England countryside with a knife-grinding wheel and a heart full of joy.
R. Holmes & Co.: Being the Remarkable Adventures of Raffles Holmes, Esq., Detective and Amateur Cracksman by Birth
John Kendrick Bangs
Conceived by two grand literary lineages, Raffles Holmes carries a double inheritance: the analytical intellect of Sherlock Holmes and the larcenous instincts of A. J. Raffles.
Reading Made Easy for Foreigners - Third Reader
John Ludwig Hülshof
A structured path toward civic belonging unfolds through poetry, historical portraiture, natural science, and foundational constitutional texts.
Sketches from Memory: (From: "The Doliver Romance and Other Pieces: Tales and Sketches")
Nathaniel Hawthorne
A keen observer wanders through the bustling borderlands and infant cities of early nineteenth-century America, recording the quiet poetry and restless energy of a nation in motion.
The Bradys' Chinese Clew
Francis Worcester Doughty
A sudden rainstorm in New York opens a hole in a Chinatown sidewalk, dropping a boy into a subterranean network of secret rooms and launching a race for buried government treasure.
The Chief Legatee
Anna Katharine Green
A bride disappears hours after her wedding, setting off a desperate search across Connecticut that uncovers secret identities, fake twins, and a high-stakes conspiracy targeting a vast fortune.
The Lost Road
Richard Harding Davis
A war correspondent dies while the greatest conflict of his era remains unfinished, leaving behind stories of soldiers, idealists, schemers, and reluctant fugitives bound by duty, pride, and love.
The Real Dope
Ring Lardner
An thick-headed American pitcher writes home to his midwestern buddy from the mud, drafty transport ships, and trenches of France during the First World War.
Three Sides of Paradise Green
Augusta Huiell Seaman
A persistent village rumor, a misplaced journal, and a strange French visitor turn three young neighbors into historical detectives in quiet, early twentieth-century New England.
A Book o' Nine Tales
Arlo Bates
This collection of nine short stories, interspersed with brief, whimsical interludes, explores the intersection of the mundane and the mysterious in late 19th-century life. With a sharp eye for social artifice and a penchant for the uncanny, the narratives navigate the delicate boundary between a well-ordered…
Adrift in New York: Tom and Florence Braving the World
Alger, Horatio, Jr.
A sinister cousin schemed to rob an elderly merchant of his fortune, but he failed to count on a streetwise newsboy and a brave young woman fighting for the truth.
Carolina chansons
DuBose Heyward
The salt air of the Carolina coast rises from these pages, where history and legend collide in a lyrical exploration of a landscape haunted by its own past.
Dominie Dean: A Novel
Ellis Parker Butler
A young minister arrives at a Mississippi River boomtown to find his life shaped by small-town factionalism, wartime divides, and a lifetime of devotion to a community that eventually forgets him.
Edward MacDowell: A Great American Tone Poet, His Life and Music
John Fielder Porte
A pioneering composer fights for an authentic American classical music, pushing past European traditions to create a fresh sound rooted in his homeland’s natural landscapes and living history.
Highacres
Jane Abbott
When an urban stranger gets lost on Kettle Mountain, a simple mountain girl's long-cherished dream of seeing the world beyond her quiet valley is set in motion.
John Rawn, Prominent Citizen
Emerson Hough
The rise of a ruthless industrialist collides with the shifting tides of American society, revealing the hollow core of unchecked ambition. This is a study of power, greed, and the human cost of a life measured solely by acquisition.
Kalitan, Our Little Alaskan Cousin
Mary F. Nixon-Roulet
An inquisitive American boy explores the wilderness and coastal settlements of turn-of-the-century Alaska alongside a native chief's young son.
Malaeska: The Indian Wife of the White Hunter
Ann S. (Ann Sophia) Stephens
A native woman's secret marriage to a white hunter ignites a tragic cycle of racial prejudice, hidden identity, and maternal heartbreak across two generations along the early American frontier.
Snow-Bound: A Winter Idyll
John Greenleaf Whittier
When a violent December storm seals a New England farm household indoors, the quiet routines of snowbound isolation turn a simple hearth into a chapel of memory, storytelling, and enduring affection.
State of the Union Addresses
Thomas Jefferson
Written with calm executive authority, these presidential messages capture an early American republic balancing its grand continental ambitions against volatile European wars and internal financial restraint.
The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I
William James Stillman
A boyhood spent beneath the shadow of unyielding New England Puritanism gives way to a wide-ranging adult life spent among art, nature, and the early fires of modern political conflict.
The Ball of Fire
George Randolph Chester
A modern industrial titan schemes to monopolize America's core commodities while a fiery young woman and a fashionable minister clash over the soul and real estate of a historic Manhattan church.
The Daredevil
Maria Thompson Daviess
When a orphaned French aristocrat disguised as her own twin brother sets sail for America to escape wartime peril, she finds herself tangled in political intrigue, military mule contracts, and southern hospitality.
The Daughters of the Little Grey House
Marion Ames Taggart
Growing up brings change to a quiet home as three sisters face the first choices of their adult lives.
The Meccas of the World: The Play of Modern Life in New York, Paris, Vienna, Madrid and London
Ruth Cranston
An intimate travel chronicle contrasts the high-stakes cultural rituals of five global capitals, revealing how each city's unique social theater shapes the modern human spirit.
The Old Apple Dealer (From "Mosses from an Old Manse")
Nathaniel Hawthorne
A quiet observer at a bustling railroad depot fixates on a withered, frostbitten vendor selling apples and gingerbread, finding a strange, quiet mystery in a life so utterly devoid of hope or vitality.
The Pot Boiler: A Comedy in Four Acts
Upton Sinclair
Hunger and artistic pride collide in a cramped New York tenement as a struggling writer tries to craft a commercial hit while his family starves.
The Shadowy Third, and Other Stories
Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow
A phantom child steps into the dim light of a New York townhouse, pulling back the veil on human betrayal and the invisible wounds that haunt the living long after the dead are buried.
Added Upon: A Story
Nephi Anderson
A mortal life on earth is merely one single chapter in an eternal progression that stretches from pre-mortal spirit existence to final resurrection and celestial glory.
Mrs. Dud's Sister
Josephine Daskam Bacon
A quiet, reflective man stumbles away from a glittering estate party and finds, tucked behind a high green hedge, a sanctuary of memory, fresh cookies, and the possibility of a late-in-life love.
Myths and Legends of Our Own Land
Charles M. (Charles Montgomery) Skinner
These stories capture the restless spirit of a young nation, blending the ghosts of the American frontier with the echoes of colonial history and ancient indigenous lore.