Peter Joyce

A Master of Craft’ was written in 1900. It was said of W.W.Jacobs that he was one of the few writers who succeeded in being deliberately humorous. In this yarn, dedicated to his wife, he tells of marital mishap and misadventure among mariners in the...

This book was the inspiration for an enormous achievement. The Peoples Palace for the entertainment and instruction of the working class was opened in the East End in 1887, five years after the book was published. It had changed peoples lives and was...

In 1842, Charles Dickens visited America. His reception was somewhat colder than that which usually greeted him – already a successful author in both Britain and the U.S. This lack of enthusiasm from the Americans was partly due to his criticism of...

Set against the international background of the late Victorian rich and privileged, The African Millionaire is a far-fetched and farcical romp in which gullible Sir Charles Vandrift MP is slowly but steadily parted from his vast wealth by a series of...

Set in stifled industrial Staffordshire in the late nineteenth century against a strong evangelical background Anna of the Five Towns tells of the courting of hard businessman Ephraim Tellright's daughter by prosperous and accomplished Henry Mynors....

Twenty years since their first adventure in Africa Leo assures Holly that Ayesha is alive and implores him to find her. They search through Asia and eventually arrive in the city of Kaloon, ruled by the mad Khan Rassen and his devious wife, the Khania...

On one level Melville’s tale is an historical adventure story telling of life aboard ship shortly after the mutiny at Spithead in 1797. Billy is taken from a homeward bound merchantman to serve on the ‘Seventy Four’ HMS Indomitable. He falls foul of...

Harvey Cheyne, pampered son of an American millionaire is swept overboard from the deck of a liner and picked up by a small fishing boat, one of several trawling the Grand Banks. He is rapidly confronted by the harsh realities of life and comes to...

James of the Glens has been falsely arrested for the murder of Colin Roy Campbell, and David Balfour who was present at the scene, makes a statement to tell his side of the story, meeting Lord Advocate Prestongrange and his charming daughter, Barbara...

The tale of a rural habitation in the late 19th Century and the effect of industrialisation on the local community.Seventeen year old Phillis lives on Hope Farm with her parents Minister Ebenezer Holman and his simple wife. Her second cousin Paul...

Dr Jekyll creates a potion whereby he can divide the good and evil parts of his personality and thus free the good side to work for the benefit of mankind without the distraction of his baser instincts. Unfortunately, he undertakes the experiment...

Not only is 'Erewhon' an adventure story but also Butler's satirical inversion of English customs and philosophy in the 19th century. The explorer Higgs discovers a well organised and civilised country - apparently idyllic. However, the body politic...

Eugénie Grandet is Balzac's first great novel and one of the series Comédie Humaine. At the beginning of the story the heroine lives an unfulfilled life in rural France, her nature crushed by a domineering and miserly father.Gallant cousin Charles...

This story is the record of a struggle between two temperaments, two consciences and almost two epochs. It ended, as was inevitable, in disruption. Of the two human beings here described, one was born to fly backward, the other could not help being...

The term ’shameless hussy’ could have been invented to describe the main protagonist of Daudets first international bestseller. There are more vulgar epithets one could apply to ‘Little Chebe’ as she schemes her way up the ladder to reach social...

The second of Richard Hannays’ adventures takes him from the trenches of the First World War on a mission of vital importance to the British campaign in the East. In an attempt to manipulate their Turkish allies the Germans have created a religious...

Bobby, a sparky silver haired Skye terrier, adopts Auld Jock, a worn out simple shepherd, as his master. Jock is 'let go' by the farmer and dies in poverty having suffered one winter too many. The farmer tries to reclaim Bobby as a pet for his...

Hamlet was written between 1597 and 1600, just after the death of Shakespeare’s only son, Hamlet, one of twins, who died aged 11 in 1596. Despite scholarly argument that this was mere coincidence, it is impossible to believe that a writer as sensitive...

"He was too imperious, too masterful, too much inclined to think that all things should be made to go as he would have them."Thus Trollope describes his hero Harry Heathcote, a settler and sheep farmer in the untamed bush of Australia in 1871....

Bennett described his story as an ‘Idyllic Diversion’. Helen Rathbone meets her elderly uncle, James Ollerenshaw, in Bursley Park, after an estrangement of several years. Both are very strong willed, independent characters. Helen has an extravagant...

The third and final collection in this series of reflections written by one of the wittiest and whimsical men to press pen against paper. As well as his usual take on the foibles of his fellow Englishmen and women, Jerome ruminates, in his typically...

Over one hundred years since it was first published Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow addresses subjects which are still relevant today – perhaps more so! Being hard up, being in the blues and being in love are just some aspects of the human condition...

The greatest romantic narrative novel of the early 19th Century, John Halifax, Gentleman, tells the story of an orphan boy whose first words in the story are “Sir, I want work; may I earn a penny?” By hard work, diligent study and an unshakeable faith...

Newly born Judith is found in by eccentric Squire Gauntry in the chilled sombre ruin of a house on a bitter winter's night, her parents having died at her birth. With such a tenuous start, the child grows up to have an intense lust for life and...