Harry Potter en de Gevangene van Azkaban van J.K. Rowling verscheen in 1999 voor het eerst in Engeland en is het derde deel van een zevendelige reeks. Wereldwijd werden ruim 500.000.000 boeken verkocht in 69 verschillende talen en in 200 verschillende landen. Sirius Zwarts, een beruchte volgeling van Voldemort, is uit de gevangenis van Azkaban ontsnapt en heeft het wellicht op Harry gemunt. Harry is inmiddels aan een enerverend schooljaar begonnen met nieuwe vakken als Dreuzelkunde en zorg voor Fabeldieren, spannende Zwerkbalwedstrijden en griezelige voorspellingen. De school wordt bewaakt door Dementors, de gevreesde bewakers van Azkaban, en Harry zal zijn lessen Verweer tegen de Zwarte Kunsten hard nodig hebben.

It is the driest, flattest, hottest, most desiccated, infertile and climatically aggressive of all the inhabited continents and still Australia teems with life - a large portion of it quite deadly. In fact, Australia has more things that can kill you in a very nasty way than anywhere else. Ignoring such dangers - and yet curiously obsessed by them - Bill Bryson journeyed to Australia and promptly fell in love with the country. And who can blame him? The people are cheerful, extrovert, quick-witted and unfailingly obliging: their cities are safe and clean and nearly always built on water; the food is excellent; the beer is cold and the sun nearly always shines. Life doesn't get much better than this...

Harry gaat naar het tweede jaar van Hogwarts/ Zweinstein School voor hekserij. Hij krijgt echter waarschuwingen van een huis-elf, genaamd Dobby, om niet terug te keren naar Hogwarts/Zweinstein. Hij negeert de waarschuwing en gaat terug. Er gebeuren echter vreemde dingen op school. Mensen raken verlamd en niemand weet wat het veroorzaakt! Harry hoort steeds een stem; een stem die uit de muren van de school lijkt te komen.

Harry en zijn vrienden gaan op onderzoek uit en krijgen het verhaal van de geheime kamer te horen. Deze kamer kon alleen geopend worden door Salazar Slytherin/ Zwadderich. Harry kan sisseltong praten, wat betekent dat hij met de slangen kan praten. Hij is daarom de enige die de stem uit de muur kan verstaan. Iedereen denkt dat het Harry was die de kamer geopend heeft, aangezien Zwadderich bekent stond om zijn slangentong. Ook al is Harry ingedeeld bij Griffoendor, iedereen verdenkt hem toch.

After the brutal murder of his great-uncle, Julius Caesar, Octavian, a shy and scholarly youth of nineteen, suddenly finds himself heir to the vast power of Rome. He is destined, despite vicious power struggles, bloody wars and family strife, to transform his realm and become the greatest ruler the western world had ever seen: Augustus Caesar, the first Roman Emperor.

Building on impeccable research, John Williams brings the legendary figure of Augustus vividly to life, and invests his characters with such profound humanity that we enter completely into the heat and danger of their lives and times.

An irresistible new edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone created with ultra-talented designers MinaLima, the design magicians behind the gorgeous visual graphic style of the Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts films. J.K. Rowling's complete and unabridged text is accompanied by MinaLima's handsome colour illustrations on nearly every page, superb design, and eight exclusive interactive paper-engineered elements - including Harry's Hogwarts letter, the magical entrance to Diagon Alley, a sumptuous feast in the Great Hall of Hogwarts and more. Designed and illustrated by the iconic house of MinaLima - best known for establishing the graphic design of the Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts films - this is the perfect gift for Harry Potter fans and a beautiful addition to any collector's bookshelf, enticing readers of all ages to discover the Harry Potter novels all over again.

The second collection of blazingly original short stories from Booker prize-winning, Sunday Times-bestselling author Ian McEwan. A two-timing pornographer becomes the unwilling object of one of his victim's vengeful fantasies. A millionaire buys himself the perfect mistress - passive, yet beautiful - but the union soon becomes a nightmare of jealousy and despair. And an ape reflects on the relationship with a young female writer, mourning their fading love and musing on the fateful deceptions of art. In these seven stories of dream-like lucidity, the wasteland of the human psyche is mapped with deadly precision. 'Resonant and frightening...totally original' Observer 'Exact, tender, funny, voluptuous, disturbing' The Times

In the not-too-distant future, a radical government has come to power in Great Britain and the Royal family has been moved to a housing estate in Leicester. For the first time, the Royals have to live as ordinary people and they find the experience baffling and frightening, but ultimately enriching. A satire on the failings of the welfare state, the pretensions, expectations and personal foibles of the Royal Family - this warm-hearted and affectionate comedy concerning the Royals' attempts to come to terms with their new situation with moments of gentle irony alternating with pure farce - are just some of the facets of this many-layered and entertaining fantasy.

HBO's hit series A GAME OF THRONES is based on George R R Martin's internationally bestselling series A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE, the greatest fantasy epic of the modern age. A DANCE WITH DRAGONS: AFTER THE FEAST is the SECOND part of the fifth volume in the series. 'A brutally modern take on human nature' Telegraph 'Some had been heroes, some weaklings, knaves, or cravens. Most were only men. The best of them overcame their flaws, did their duty, and died with their swords in their hands. The worst . . . the worst were those who played the game of thrones' The future of the Seven Kingdoms hangs in the balance. Cersei Lannister, awaits trial, abandoned by all those she trusted; while in the east her brother Tyrion has been sold as a slave. Stannis Baratheon marches south from the wall to besiege Winterfell. But beyond the Wall the wildling armies are massing for an assault... On all sides bitter conflicts are reigniting, played out by outlaws and priests, nobles and slaves. The tides of destiny will lead to the greatest dance of all.

Far in the future, the World Controllers have created the ideal society. Through clever use of genetic engineering, brainwashing and recreational sex and drugs all its members are happy consumers. Bernard Marx seems alone harbouring an ill-defined longing to break free. A visit to one of the few remaining Savage Reservations where the old, imperfect life still continues, may be the cure for his distress. . . Huxleys ingenious fantasy of the future sheds a blazing light on the present and is considered to be his most enduring masterpiece.

De Zeven Koninkrijken zijn verdeeld...

Met de dood van Robb Stark is de opstand van het noorden in één klap een halt toegeroepen. Stannis en zijn leger zijn noodgedwongen ingetrokken bij de Nachtwacht. Achter de Muur loert echter een onheilspellende vijand... En op de IJzerlanden heeft een nieuwe, wrede koning de plaats ingenomen van Balon Grauwvreugd.

In het zuiden is Koningslanding nog altijd niet hersteld van de dood van de monsterlijke kindkoning Joffry en diens grootvader, Tywin Lannister. Cersei heeft de IJzeren Troon in haar macht, maar het is de vraag voor hoelang. De schulden van het rijk lopen op, en oude en nieuwe vijanden dienen zich aan...

This is the heart-rending story of a woman struggling to reclaim her dignity after a violent, abusive marriage and a worsening drink problem. Paula Spencer recalls her contented childhood, the audacity she learned as a teenager, the exhilaration of her romance with Charlo, and the marriage to him that left her powerless. Capturing both her vulnerability and her strength, Doyle gives Paula a voice that is real and unforgettable.

Het Spel der Tronen is het eerste boek uit George R.R. Martins Game of Thrones - in vertaling Het Lied van IJs en Vuur. Van de serie werden wereldwijd inmiddels 75 miljoen boeken verkocht.

Het spel der Tronen verhaalt van de liefdes, de levens en de ambities van de Baratheons, de Lannisters, de Starks en al die andere grote families van de Zeven Koninkrijken. Het begint allemaal in het zuiden, aan het hof, waar de Lannisters sterke spelers zijn. De macht van de koning is tanende. Zijn Hand is onder verdachte omstandigheden om het leven gekomen. Velen zijn uit op eigen gewin. Als de koning Eddard Stark tegen diens zin benoemt tot zijn nieuwe Hand, wordt zowel hij als zijn familie betrokken bij de meest omvattende machtsstrijd ooit, het levensgevaarlijke spel der tronen.

Great Expectations, Dickenss funny, frightening and tender portrayal of the orphan Pips journey of self-discovery, is one of his best-loved works. Showing how a young mans life is transformed by a mysterious series of events - an encounter with an escaped prisoner; a visit to a black-hearted old woman and a beautiful girl; a fortune from a secret donor - Dickenss late novel is a masterpiece of psychological and moral truth, and Pip among his greatest creations. the Penguin English Library - 100 editions of the best fiction in English, from the eighteenth century and the very first novels to the beginning of the First World War.

Inhaltsangabe: Abstract: Paul Auster's New York Trilogy, published in one volume for the first time in England in 1988 and in the U.S. in 1990 has been widely categorised as detective fiction among literary scholars and critics. There is, however, a striking diversity and lack of consensus regarding the classification of the trilogy within the existing genre forms of the detective novel. Among others, Auster's stories are described as: metaanti-detective-fiction; mysteries about mysteries; a strangely humorous working of the detective novel; very soft-boiled; a metamystery; glassy little jigsaws; a mixture between the detective story and the nouveau roman; a metaphysical detective story; a deconstruction of the detective novel; antidetective-fiction; a late example of the anti-detective genre; and being related to 'hard-boiled' novels by authors like Hammett and Chandler. Such a striking lack of agreement within the secondary literature has inspired me to write this paper. It does not, however, elaborate further an this diversity of viewpoints although they all seem to have a certain validity and underline the richness and diversity of Auster's detective trilogy; neither do I intend to coin a new term for Auster's detective fiction. I would rather place The New York Trilogy within a more general and open literary form, namely postmodern detective fiction. This classifies Paul Auster as an American writer who is part of the generation that immediately followed the 'classical literary movement' of American postmodernism' of the 60s and 70s. His writing demonstrates that he has been influenced by the revolutionary and innovative postmodern concepts, characterised by the notion of 'anything goes an a planet of multiplicity' as well as by French poststructuralism. He may, however, be distinguished from a 'traditional' postmodern writer through a certain coherence in the narrative discourse, a neo-realistic approach and by showing a certain responsi"

De Strijd der Koningen is het tweede boek uit George R.R. Martins Game of Thrones - in vertaling Het Lied van IJs en Vuur. Van de serie werden wereldwijd inmiddels 75 miljoen boeken verkocht.

Sinds de dood van koning Robert is Westeros in rep en roer. De opvolgingstwisten om de IJzeren Troon bereiken een hoogtepunt als Stannis Baratheon, in raad en daad gesteund door de ambitieuze Melisandre, zich naar Koningslanding begeeft.

Duidelijk is dat koningin Cersei alles op alles zal zetten om haar zoon Joffry te steunen als opvolger van Robert. Niet helemaal duidelijk is wat de geslepen en altijd manipulerende kobold Tyrion Lannister precies in zijn schild voert.

Intussen trekt vanuit het noorden Robb Stark ten strijde tegen de Lannisters en ver weg, op een ander continent, koestert Daenerys Targaryen haar snel groeiende draken, en droomt ze van een terugkeer naar Koningslanding...

In Ziek van liefde sleept Ian McEwan de lezer onherroepelijk mee in het verhaal van Joe Rose, die toevallig betrokken raakt bij een tragisch ongeval met een luchtballon.
Bij het ongeluk vindt een korte ontmoeting plaats tussen Rose en een zekere Jed Parry. Dit lijkt aanvankelijk niet meer dan een onschuldig incident, maar al spoedig blijkt uitgerekend deze ontmoeting het begin te zijn van een angstaanjagende nachtmerrie.

Ziek van liefde is een spannende roman over hoe een obsessieve verliefdheid iemand kan veranderen in een levengevaarlijke stalker. Enduring Love werd verfilmd met in de hoofdrol '007' Daniel Craig.

Een Storm van Zwaarden - Staal en Sneeuw is het derde boek uit George R.R. Martins Game of Thrones - in vertaling Het Lied van IJs en Vuur. Van de serie werden wereldwijd inmiddels 75 miljoen boeken verkocht.

De winter nadert, de Zeven Koninkrijken raken door bloedveten verdeeld. Ondertussen bereiden de leden van de Nachtwacht zich voor op de komst van een leger vogelvrijen uit de ijzige streken voorbij de Muur. De groep wilden van deze woestenij maken zich op voor een invasie van het Noordelijke Rijk, waar de jeugdige Robb Stark nog maar zo kort zijn kroon draagt.

Robb wordt door bittere gevoelens gekweld - zijn zusters zijn verdwenen, dood of overgeleverd aan de grillen van de wrede kindkoning Joffry, die met meedogenloos harde hand het zuiden regeert. Het is niet de vraag of, maar wanneer de strijd zal losbarsten.

In the relentless summer heat, four abruptly orphaned children retreat into a shadowy, isolated world, and find their own strange and unsettling ways of fending for themselves...

Dazzling... Profound and urgent' Observer 'A book of great maturity, beautifully alive to the fragility of happiness and all forms of violence... Everyone should read Saturday' Financial Times Saturday, February 15, 2003. Henry Perowne, a successful neurosurgeon, stands at his bedroom window before dawn and watches a plane - ablaze with fire like a meteor - arcing across the London sky. Over the course of the following day, unease gathers about Perowne, as he moves amongst hundreds of thousands of anti-war protestors in the post-9/11 streets. A minor car accident brings him into confrontation with Baxter, a fidgety, aggressive man, who to Perowne's professional eye appears to be profoundly unwell. But it is not until Baxter makes a sudden appearance at the Perowne family home that Henry's earlier fears seem about to be realised...

Kazuo Ishiguro's new novel Klara and the Sun is now available* Shortlisted for the 2005 Booker Prize Kazuo Ishiguro imagines the lives of a group of students growing up in a darkly skewed version of contemporary England. Narrated by Kathy, now thirty-one, Never Let Me Go dramatises her attempts to come to terms with her childhood at the seemingly idyllic Hailsham School and with the fate that has always awaited her and her closest friends in the wider world. A story of love, friendship and memory, Never Let Me Go is charged throughout with a sense of the fragility of life. 'Exquisite.' Guardian 'A feat of imaginative sympathy.' New York Times What readers are saying: 'A book I will return to again and again, and one that keeps me thinking even after finishing it. 5/5 stars' 'I loved it, every single word of it.' 'It took me wholly by surprise.' 'Utterly beautiful.' 'Essentially perfect.'

Onverminderd geselen kleine en grote veldslagen het continent Westeros. Het Huis Lannister heeft zijn greep op de IJzeren Troon verstevigd, maar het zwarte schaap van de familie, Tyrion Lannister, verzet zich in stilte tegen zijn zuster, die zowel zijn vader als zijn verwende neef manipuleert.

Robb Stark heeft andere problemen. Hij is gedwongen zijn jonge koninkrijk te verdedigen tegen de plunderingen van de verraderlijke Grauwvreugd-clan, die het noorden wil opeisen.

Ook Jon Sneeuw staat voor een moeilijke keuze: vertrekken van de Muur of het hoofd bieden aan de strijdmacht die aan de andere kant optrekt? Een continent verderop nemen de krachten van Daenerys Stormgeboren en haar draken met de dag toe.

The unforgettable novel of a childhood in a sleepy Southern town and the crisis of conscience that rocked it, To Kill A Mockingbird became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award-winning film, also a classic. Compassionate, dramatic, and deeply moving, To Kill A Mockingbird takes readers to the roots of human behavior - to innocence and experience, kindness and cruelty, love and hatred, humor and pathos. Now with over 18 million copies in print and translated into forty languages, this regional story by a young Alabama woman claims universal appeal. Harper Lee always considered her book to be a simple love story. Today it is regarded as a masterpiece of American literature.

Bill Bryson has the rare knack of being out of his depth wherever he goes - even (perhaps especially) in the land of his birth. This became all too apparent when, after nearly two decades in England, the world's best-loved travel writer upped sticks with Mrs Bryson, little Jimmy et al. and returned to live in the country he had left as a youth. Of course there were things Bryson missed about Blighty but any sense of loss was countered by the joy of rediscovering some of the forgotten treasures of his childhood: the glories of a New England autumn; the pleasingly comical sight of oneself in shorts; and motel rooms where you can generally count on being awakened in the night by a piercing shriek and the sound of a female voice pleading, 'Put the gun down, Vinnie, I'll do anything you say.' Whether discussing the strange appeal of breakfast pizza or the jaw-slackening direness of American TV, Bill Bryson brings his inimitable brand of bemused wit to bear on that strangest of phenomena - the American way of life.

William Golding's Lord of the Flies is a dystopian classic: 'exciting, relevant and thought-provoking' (Stephen King). When a group of schoolboys are stranded on a desert island, what could go wrong? 'One of my favorite books - I read it every couple of years.' (Suzanne Collins, author of The Hunger Games) A plane crashes on a desert island. The only survivors are a group of schoolboys. By day, they discover fantastic wildlife and dazzling beaches, learning to survive; at night, they are haunted by nightmares of a primitive beast. Orphaned by society, it isn't long before their innocent childhood games devolve into a savage, murderous hunt ... 'Stands out mightily in my memory ... Such a strong statement about the human heart.' (Patricia Cornwell) 'Terrifying and haunting.' (Kingsley Amis) 'Beautifully written, tragic and provocative.' (E. M. Forster) ONE OF THE BBC'S ICONIC 'NOVELS THAT SHAPED OUR WORLD' What readers are saying: 'Every real human being should read this ... This is what we are.' 'It's brilliant, it's captivating, it's thought provoking and brutal and for some, its truly terrifying.' 'It can be read and re-read many times, and every time something new will appear.' 'There is a reason why this is studied at school ... Excellent read.' 'This is one of the few books I've read that I keep on my Kindle to read again.' 'I revisit this every few years and it's always fresh and impressive ... One of the best books I've ever read.'

Reality bends all the more acutely with lack of sleep in this stunning novel from the master of the surreal. Eyes mark the shape of the city The midnight hour approaches in an almost-empty diner. Mari sips her coffee and reads a book, but soon her solitude is disturbed: a girl has been beaten up at the Alphaville hotel, and needs Mari's help. Meanwhile Mari's beautiful sister Eri lies in a deep, heavy sleep that is 'too perfect, too pure' to be normal; it has lasted for two months. But tonight as the digital clock displays 00:00, a hint of life flickers across the television screen in her room, even though it's plug has been pulled out. Strange nocturnal happenings, or a trick of the night? 'A captivating mood piece, delicate and wistful' Evening Standard