De

Emilie de Fontaine is a spoiled and pround brat. She rejects all suitors her father proposes. Emilie has incredibly high standards for the man she will marry, and at the top of her unreasonable list of criteria is that he absolutely must be a peer of France. Leaving Paris for the summer, as all good families do, they go to Sceaux. At the local ball, Emilie falls in love with a charming, beautifully mannered, elegant young man. Is he noble? Will he bestow a title on his wife...

„Domestic Peace”, a short story by Honoré de Balzac, was originally published in 1831 under the French title of „La Paix du Ménage” and can be found in Scenes from private life (Scenes de la vie privee) in „La Comedie Humaine”. It takes place in November of 1809 at the height of Napoleon’s empire, a time of great splendor and decadence. Everyone who’s anyone in the Parisian aristocracy is gathered at a grand ball at the home of the Comte de Gondreville. Two guys Martial and...

Monsieur Guillaume is a draper in Paris. He owns his shop, „La Maison du Chat-qui-pelote” and took the business over from his master, also marrying the daughter. Guillaume is the very portrait of the successful bourgeois. He has three clerks apprenticed to him, the first of whom, Joseph, is an orphan he intends to marry to his elder daughter Virginie. However, Joseph is in love with the younger daughter Augustine but Augustine is in love with a successful artist Théodore. H...

In 1807 Colonel Chabert, Napoleon’s beloved commander, is severely wounded in the Battle of Eylau. Taken for dead and buried in a mass grave, he manages to escape and wanders in poverty through Europe for 10 years, torn between life and death, oblivion and consciousness. Finally recovering his memories, he sets out for Paris to search for his wife who had been a prostitute before he married her and to reclaim his possessions. In the several years while he had been gone, his...

„The Country Doctor” („Le Médecin de Campagne”), by Honoré de Balzac, belongs to the series known as „Scenes from Country Life”; a part of his great cycle of fiction, „The Comedy of Human Life”. It is one of Balzac’s noblest pieces of fiction, presenting beautiful traits of human nature with sympathy and power. The scene is laid in a village near Grenoble in France, and the story begins with the year 1829. Doctor Benassis is the title character of this novel. He is a compas...

In a dark, narrow street in Paris lives an old widow and her pretty young daughter, sit by the window most days. They share a poor but contented existence, supporting themselves through embroidery work. They see a gentleman in a brown coat pass by in the mornings and return in the evenings. The mother always remarks that he appears either over-worked or in delicate health. The daughter ignores most of her remarks as her mother sees every passer-by as a possible protector fo...

An extremely collectible, sweet little book named for and written in honor of Balzac’s mother. Comtesse Honorine de Bauvan was married to the Comte at nineteen. She leaves him and is later abandoned by her lover when she becomes pregnant. She lives simply and earns money by making artificial flowers. What she doesn’t know is that her husband is paying exorbitant prices for her work, thus supporting her while letting her think she is independent of him. The story is perhaps ...

Inside the Lines is a drama that developed during the First World War. The story about a business woman who came to New York to visit her department store. She meets an officer in the British signal corps. He escorts her to Paris and advises to quickly complete his business and return to America before the start of the war. But our heroine does the opposite and is in difficult circumstances.

The dead body of a beautiful girl in a disused house, the secret meeting room in the cellar, a baffling murder mystery... „The Dagger and Cord” is another mystery by Aidan de Brune (Herbert Charles CULL). It’s all great fun and the author keeps the action moving along swiftly, as he always did. Wonderful entertainment and highly entertaining. If you haven’t discovered the joys of Brune’s mysteries there is a good place to start. Aidan De Brune was a Canadian-born writer who...

„The Way of an Eagle” novel (1919) opens in India, as scapegrace Nick Ratcliffe rescues Muriel, the general’s daughter, from dire peril. Between starvation and attack, death is almost certain. Nick is small, odd-looking, and unpredictable. But he has somehow won the general’s unconditional confidence. Not so with Muriel. Repelled yet fascinated by his mockery and ferocity – his way of an eagle – she agrees to a betrothal, then breaks it off for clean-cut Blake Grange. Back ...

First published in 1913, „The Rocks of Valpré” is a novel by the British writer Ethel M. Dell. While readers adored Ethel M. Dell’s novels, critics hated them with a passion; but she did not care what the critics thought. She considered herself a good storyteller – nothing more and nothing less. Ethel M. Dell continued to write novels for a number of years. „The Rocks of Valpré” novel is set in the mid-nineteenth century when an officer wrongly imprisoned on Devil’s Island ...

This is another Ethel Dell novel. Sylvia Ingleton is left motherless at an early age. Her father remarried a woman who is not happy to share her household with Sylvia. Soon, Sylvia is entangled in webs of deceit to get her married off. Boldly, she announces to her father and would be suitor that she will rejoin her fiancé of five years in South Africa. The backdrop of South Africa’s wilderness, drought, cloud bursts and love triangles leaves Sylvia in a struggle to survive....

„The Swindler and Other Stories” is a collection of stories first published in 1923 by the hugely successful English writer of popular romances Ethel May Dell. „The Swindler”: As a young girl Cynthia holds a professional swindler in admiration, since he cleverly swindled her out of five hundred pounds. On a voyage she meets a private detective called West who is bent on capturing this swindler called Nat Verney. Little did Cynthia know what the favor she asked of West would...

This is another wonderful Christian love story by British writer of popular romance novels Ethel M. Dell. She was a popular 20th century writer who wrote dozens of romance novels and several short stories, including the well known „The Keeper of the Door” series. Our story takes place mainly in a little fishing village in England. This small seaside village hides a romance for Juliet Moore – a romance with Dick Green, the village schoolmaster, a very different sort of man t...

Ethel May Dell was a British writer of popular romance novels who produced about thirty novels and several volumes of short stories. The public loved her stories and the books were hugely popular. The scene of this splendid story is laid in India and tells of the lamp of love that continues to shine through all sorts of tribulations to final happiness. When Stella comes to India unaccompanied to join her brother Tommy with his regiment, the tongues wag. In order to become r...

A set of five melodramatic love short stories, first published in 1917 and written by a popular 20th century writer Ethel M. Dell. „The Safety Curtain” is an unusual love story that takes place in India mainly and has much excitement. A dragonfly-like dancing girl is rescued by a subaltern when he offers her a marriage of convenience and takes her to his station in India. But she hides a mysterious past and eventually it catches up. Will love be able to conquer all? This co...

1912. Ethel May Dell (1881-1939), British writer, began writing at a young age. Most of her stories were stories of passion and love set in India and other British colonial possessions. American Nap Errol is in love with reserved Englishwoman, Lady Anne. Lady Anne is unhappily married to an unpleasant, wealthy drunk, who is twice her age. Nap is, in his own and most other’s opinion, a knave and a bounder. Lady Anne, miserable in her situation, is honor bound to her husband ...

First published in 1918. Ethel M. Dell was an English writer of popular romance novels. You will find some fascinating glimpses of the period in her books, as well as a substantial dose of romance and adventure. There were two of them as unlike as two men could be. Sir Eustace, big, domineering, haughty, used to sweeping all before him with the power of his personality. The other was Stumpy, small, insignificant, quiet, with a little limp. They clashed over the greatest que...

A romance originally published in 1922 that holds up very well into the 21st century. „Charles Rex” is a sequel of „The Hundredth Chance” written by Ethel May Dell (1881-1939) who was a British writer of popular romance novels. Her stories are often full of passion and love and are set in India and other British colonial possessions. Not being a family man, Charles Rex travels widely and to some point aimlessly. On his last night in Italy, he rescues a small boy from a beat...

Another great book of six hot romantic stories by Edith M. Dell, one of her best romantic collections including an adventure and suspense story titled. „Rosa Mundi” is a story of redemption, forgiveness and making peace with oneself. A needy young woman becomes a „dancing girl” to feed and succor her dying mother. After many years, she learns how to have self respect once again, through the words of reclusive author. The book includes also: „A Debt of Honor”, „The Deliverer...