"Friendship is the only cement that will ever hold the world together."Mark Twain's short story, My Platonic Sweetheart, is a charming exploration of friendship and love in which the main character (believed to represent Twain) dreams of the same woman repeatedly throughout his lifetime. Across five dreams, the narrator and the woman take on different names, and the woman's appearance changes while their ages (he, seventeen, she, fifteen) remain the same. They neve...

"A horse is a good judge of character; he will never betray you."First published in two instalments in Harper's Monthly Magazine in 1906, this delightful short story follows Soldier Boy, the pride of the military cavalry, and his touching relationship with Buffalo Bill's young niece, Cathy. Mark Twain crafts a narrative that skilfully weaves together adventure, humour, and social criticism, capturing the spirit of loyalty, friendship and the extraordinary bonds that form be...

"Every nation has its own way of celebrating, but England's pageantry is unmatched."Mark Twain's Queen Victoria's Jubilee captures the splendour and sentimentality surrounding the celebration of the sixty years of Queen Victoria's reign in 1897. With his characteristic wit and keen social commentary, Twain reflects on the grandeur of the festivities and the deep emotional connection between the queen and her subjects, interweaving humour with poignant insights into...

"Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed."The American Claimant (1892) is a lively satirical novel built around mistaken identities, role‑swapping, and Twain's fascination with the absurdities of both American democracy and British aristocracy.At the centre stands Colonel Mulberry Sellers—dreamer, schemer, and eternal optimist—who becomes convinced he is the rightful heir to an English earldom. Meanwhile, the actual heir, weary...

"The mind can do wonders, but it cannot do impossibilities."Mark Twain's first article on the subject of Christian Science was published in 1899, and in 1907, the author published it and several others he had written in the book Christian Science.While Twain was generally interested in the idea that the mind can influence the body, he was very critical of the movement and its founder, Mary Baker Eddy, and rejected her teachings as incomprehensible, illogical...

"The human race has one really effective weapon: laughter."This collection of unabridged recordings of Mark Twain's non-fiction includes his five great travelogues together with the memoirs of his time working as a pilot on the Mississippi, the profound essay written to celebrate the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria, and other short pieces of non-fiction.The titles included here are:Old Times on the MississippiLife on the Mississ...

'Nothing exists; all is a dream. God—man—the world—the sun, the moon, the wilderness of stars—a dream, all a dream; they have no existence. Nothing exists save empty space—and you!'Published posthumously, The Mysterious Stranger is Mark Twain's final, unfinished novella, showcasing the writer at his most chilling.Set in a quiet Austrian town during the medieval period, Twain's provocative tale follows three children whose lives are thrown into chaos by the a...

Bloomsbury presents American Alt by Chris Lockhart, read by Todd Kramer and John ChancerAmerican Alt is a powerful memoir of crisis and redemption — a glimpse into the mind of an American conspiracy theorist, the schizophrenia, trauma, and misinformation that drove him to the brink, and the friendship that brought him back."A mesmerizing, compassionate, and deeply meaningful exploration of a perilo...

I pick up the photograph from their mantlepiece and carefully wipe away the dust. The beautiful wife. Supposedly happily married and enjoying a family vacation. I know her husband killed her. And I’m going to make him pay…This is my first job as a housekeeper, but Evan Warner doesn’t need to know that. It’s the first of many lies I’ll tell him. He just lost his wife, Lola, and now he and his young daughter Jessica ...

Why just be contrarian when you can bet against consensus and be right? Through a meta-analysis of what moves markets and what drives human behavior, New York Times bestselling author and founder of Verdad Advisers, Daniel Rasmussen cuts through the 60/40 portfolio, exposing where empirical evidence shows the best opportunities—and where projections, models, and experts often fail—to create an asset allocation that can withstand the tests of time. In this exploration of intellectual truths...

A twisting new thriller from the author of The Truth about the Harry Quebert AffairIn the summer of 1994, the quiet seaside town of Orphea reels from the discovery of two brutal murders.Confounding their superiors, two young police officers, Jesse Rosenberg and Derek Scott crack the case and arrest the murderer, earning themselves handsome promotions and the lasting respect of their colleagues.But twenty years later, just as he is on the po...

A minute-by-minute analysis of one episode (Part 8) of David Lynch's Twin Peaks: The Return (2017).Much has been written about the work of David Lynch and existential fear in relation to Americana and the American Dream-as-American Nightmare in terms that are circular and artistically self-referential—or Lynchian. But with Part 8 of his most recent work, the 2017 series Twin Peaks: The Return, Lynch locates his singular and unsettling vis...