Pierre and Agnès marry for love against the wishes of his parents and the family patriarch, the tyrannical industrialist Julien Hardelot, provoking a family feud which cascades down the generations. This is Balzac or The Forsyte Saga on a smaller, more intimate scale, the bourgeoisie observed close-up with Némirovsky's characteristically sly humour and clear-eyed compassion.

A pretty young girl has to leave home to make money for her family. She is clever and a good worker; but she is uneducated and does not know the cruel ways of the world. So, when a rich young man says he loves her, she is careful - but not careful enough. He is persuasive, and she is overwhelmed. It is not her fault, but the world says it is.... An Oxford Bookworms Library reader for learners of English, adapted from the Thomas Hardy original by Clare West.

Vanessa Paris is besotted with Benji, the devil-may-care son of John and Elizabeth Herries. Despite returning her all-consuming passion, Benji will not commit himself to marriage because he fears he can never remain constant and will eventually betray her. Benji's actions finally prompt Vanessa to leave Cumbria and seek a life in London. She stays at Hill Street with the ever persistent Ellis, who worships her.

With elegant simplicity and unswerving honesty, Irene Nemirovsky chronicles the brutalizing effects of war on three ordinary Parisian families whose lives intertwine, spanning the years between 1912 and 1941. What starts out as a glorious campaign in 1914, full of optimistic declarations of France's greatness, soon turns to shame and cynicism as the conflict drags on. Parisians, suffering from cold and hunger, seem unable or unwilling to comprehend the horrors of the trenches.

In this remarkable novel, Mauriac brings his extraordinary talent for probing the inmost core of the human character to what is arguably the most exciting theme in the world: the battle for the human soul. In all of literature there can be few more appalling studies of a soul devoured by pride and avarice, corroded by hatred.

Charlotte Dean enjoys nothing more than the solitude of her London flat and the monotonous days of her work at a travel bookshop. But when her younger sister unceremoniously bursts into her quiet life one afternoon, Charlotte's world turns topsy-turvy. Beloved author D. E. Stevenson captures the intricacies of post-World War I England with a light, comic touch that perfectly embodies the spirit of the time. Alternatively heartbreaking and witty, The Young Clementina is a touching tale of love, loss and redemption through friendship.

From peaceful Scotland to war-ravaged Europe, two female doctors from very different backgrounds fight to succeed and survive. Upper-class Lucy Graham is expected simply to marry well. Poverty-stricken Rosie Nesbitt struggles just to get by. Both girls share the unlikely dream to become a doctor, and each will do anything to succeed. When their paths cross at a party filled with eligible bachelors, it soon becomes clear that their chosen career isn't the only desire they share.

Winona is a young Lakota orphan adopted by former soldiers Thomas McNulty and John Cole. Living with Thomas and John on the farm they work in 1870s Tennessee, she is educated and loved, forging a life for herself beyond the violence and dispossession of her past. But the fragile harmony of her unlikely family unit, in the aftermath of the Civil War, is soon threatened by a further traumatic event, one which Winona struggles to confront, let alone understand. 

It is 1788. Twenty-one-year-old Elizabeth is hungry for life but, as the ward of a Devon clergyman, knows she has few prospects. When proud, scarred soldier John Macarthur promises her the earth one midsummer's night, she believes him. But Elizabeth soon realises she has made a terrible mistake. Her new husband is reckless, tormented, driven by some dark rage at the world. He tells her he is to take up a position as lieutenant in a New South Wales penal colony and she has no choice but to go.

Therese is just an ordinary sales assistant working in a New York department store when an alluring woman in her 30s walks up to her counter. Standing there, Therese is wholly unprepared for the first shock of love. She is an awkward 19-year-old with a job she hates and a boyfriend she doesn't love; Carol is a sophisticated, bored suburban housewife in the throes of a divorce and a custody battle for her only daughter. As Therese becomes irresistibly drawn into Carol's world, she soon realises how much they both stand to lose....

Unhappy in his marriage, a Moscow bank worker, Dmitri Gurov, is vacationing in Yalta, Crimea, where he sees a young lady walking along the seafront with her small dog. They are soon engaged in an affair and spend most of their time together walking and taking drives to Oreanda . Returning to Moscow and his daily routine, working by day and clubbing by night, Gurov expects to soon forget young Anna but finds he is haunted by her memory. Read in English, unabridged.

The summer of 1939 broke the Maudsley family. Cecily was only 13 years old and desperate to grow up, desperate to be as desired and reckless as her older sister, Rose. Now in her 40s, the family resemblance is uncanny, but Cecily is a shadow of her former self. A part of her died that fateful summer. Returning to the deserted family farm, Cecily recalls the light before the storm, before the war came and before the terrible family tragedy. She remembers how everyone was guarding a secret.

Three friends, Mayer (a medical student), Rybnikov (a student of the arts), and Vassilyev (a law student), decide to go out one night to get some girls. Mayer and Rybnikov had to spend some time convincing Vassilyev to come along, as he was far more fastidious and cautious than his friends. Vassilyev himself is envious of his friends, who live their lives in a much more carefree fashion.

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, (1860¿1904), was born in Russia at Taganrog on the Sea of Azov. His name has become synonymous with a certain literary style much admired and widely copied since his death. Typically, a Chekhov story is a ¿mood,¿ a state of mind, usually with regard to relations between one person and another. Under the influence of the constant, infinitesimal and unforeseen pinpricks of life, there occurs a gradual transformation of that state of mind.

Raymond Carver called Anton Chekhov "the greatest short story writer who has ever lived". This unequivocal verdict on Chekhov's genius has been echoed many times by writers as diverse as Katherine Mansfield, Somerset Maugham, John Cheever, and Tobias Wolf. While his popularity as a playwright has sometimes overshadowed his achievements in prose, the importance of Chekhov's stories is now recognized by readers as well as by fellow authors. Their themes - alienation, the absurdity and tragedy of human existence - have as much relevance today as when they were written.