Classical Myths and Stories, from the Amazons to Cleopatra

Women in Power

Classical stories about women who wield power, from the Amazons to Dido to Cleopatra 
 
In this fascinating anthology, ancient women threaten male power by stepping into the roles traditionally held by men. They command armies, exercise sexual autonomy, speak in public, issue laws and subject others (even masculine heroes and citizen men) to their control. All of these stories were written by men and none of them can be read as affirmations or celebrations of women in power. Instead, their sexist attitudes continue to justify women’s exclusion from power. 
 
Yet despite the fear and suspicion the male authors direct toward these women, we can find much to admire in their tales, from the coordinated action of the women of Aristophanes’s Assemblywomen, to the righteous anger of Boudicca against sexual violence by men in power, to the successful resistance of Amanirenas against Rome’s colonial expansion. Read differently, these tales testify to the long history of women in power and suggest new paths for female empowerment.

In this fascinating anthology, ancient women threaten male power by stepping into the roles traditionally held by men. They command armies, exercise sexual autonomy, speak in public, issue laws and subject others (even masculine heroes and citizen men) to their control. All of these stories were written by men and none of them can be read as affirmations or celebrations of women in power. Instead, their sexist attitudes continue to justify women’s exclusion from power. 
 
Yet despite the fear and suspicion the male authors direct toward these women, we can find much to admire in their tales, from the coordinated action of the women of Aristophanes’s Assemblywomen, to the righteous anger of Boudicca against sexual violence by men in power, to the successful resistance of Amanirenas against Rome’s colonial expansion. Read differently, these tales testify to the long history of women in power and suggest new paths for female empowerment.

Bundle (90 Components)

Penguin Archive

The Penguin Archive Collection: 90 classic titles celebrating 90 years of Penguin Books 
 
Taking you from a Japanese tea ceremony to the mean streets of New York, from ancient battlefields to haunted graveyards and all the way into outer space, this new Penguin Classics series brings together an eclectic range of some of the greatest, most transporting stories, ideas and poetry from ninety years of publishing. 
 
This bundle contains every title in the Penguin Archive series.

Taking you from a Japanese tea ceremony to the mean streets of New York, from ancient battlefields to haunted graveyards and all the way into outer space, this new Penguin Classics series brings together an eclectic range of some of the greatest, most transporting stories, ideas and poetry from ninety years of publishing. 
 
This bundle contains every title in the Penguin Archive series.

Festive Tales for a Joyeux Noël

A French Christmas

The English-speaking Francophiles and travellers among us who like nothing more than to suss out the soul of a foreign place can rejoice in this endearing collection of Christmas stories from ten of France’s most esteemed writers - past and present - skilfully translated

A joy to hold and page through, as it is beautifully produced ... The Christmas themes are treated with a refreshing originality and variety, and I can imagine returning to reread this collection for many Christmases to come

Wonderful anthology ... It's funky, it's wild, it's French

Guy de Maupassant (Contributor) 
GUY DE MAUPASSANT (1850-93) was known for his hugely influential short stories and the vivid realism of his novels. He was born in Normandy and served in the Franco-Prussian War, which would become the subject of some of his best-known stories. Maupassant enjoyed financial and critical success before illness led to his death in an asylum at the age of forty-two. 
 
Irène Némirovsky (Contributor) 
Irène Némirovsky was born in Kiev in 1903, the daughter of a successful Jewish banker. In 1918 her family fled the Russian Revolution for France where she became a bestselling novelist, author of David Golder, All Our Worldly Goods, The Dogs and the Wolves and other works published in her lifetime or soon after, such as the posthumously published Suite Française and Fire in the Blood. She was prevented from publishing when the Germans occupied France and moved with her husband and two small daughters from Paris to the safety of the small village of Issy-l'Evêque (in German occupied territory). It was here that Irène began writing Suite Française. She died in Auschwitz in 1942.

Joyeux Noël! Merry Christmas! These festive stories welcome Christmas à la française – delicious, chic and unexpected. 
 
Sparkling Parisian streets, opulent feasts, wandering orphans, kindly monks, oysters, bonbons, flickering desire, and more than a little wine: this collection of stories proves that the French have truly mastered Christmas. 
 
Bringing together the best French Christmas stories of all time, this lovely book includes classics by Guy de Maupassant and Alphonse Daudet, plus stories by the esteemed twentieth-century author Irène Némirovsky and contemporary writers Dominique Fabre and Jean-Philippe Blondel. 
 
Let these generous, joyous stories transport you and your loved ones into the heart of a very French Christmas.

The Big Book of Cyberpunk Vol. 1

VOLUME ONE OF TWO 
 
'A huge, eye-opening, mind-blowing surprise' Lisa Tuttle, Guardian 
 
A genre-defining-and redefining-collection of fiction's boldest, most rebellious, and most prescient genre, featuring a smorgasbord of stories from across the globe 
 
In The Big Book of Cyberpunk, award-winning anthologist Jared Shurin brings together over a hundred stories from more than twenty-five different countries. Here are tales that both establish and subvert the classic Cyberpunk tropes and aesthetic – from gritty, near-future noir to pulse-pounding action. Urban rebels undermine their monolithic corporate overlords, daring heists are conducted through back alleys and the darkest parts of the online world, and dangerous new technology, cybernetic enhancements, scheming AIs, corporate mercenaries, improbable weapons and roguish hackers all collide into rich, thrilling entertainment. Set across two volumes, these are stories that examine the near-now, extrapolating the most provocative trends into fascinating and plausible futures. 
 
We live in an increasingly Cyberpunk world, packed with complex technologies and globalised social trends. It is a world so bizarre that even the futurists couldn’t explain it – though many authors in this book have come closer than most. As both an introduction to the genre and the perfect compendium for the lifelong fan, The Big Book of Cyberpunk Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 offer more than a hundred ways to understand where we are, and where we’re going – or simply the opportunity to venture down dazzling, neon-slicked streets.

The Big Book of Cyberpunk Vol. 2

VOLUME TWO OF TWO 
 
'A huge, eye-opening, mind-blowing surprise' Lisa Tuttle, Guardian 
 
A genre-defining-and redefining-collection of fiction's boldest, most rebellious, and most prescient genre, featuring a smorgasbord of stories from across the globe 
 
In The Big Book of Cyberpunk, award-winning anthologist Jared Shurin brings together over a hundred stories from more than twenty-five different countries. Here are tales that both establish and subvert the classic Cyberpunk tropes and aesthetic [RR1] [SN2] – from gritty, near-future noir to pulse-pounding action. Urban rebels undermine their monolithic corporate overlords, daring heists are conducted through back alleys and the darkest parts of the online world, and dangerous new technology, cybernetic enhancements, scheming AIs, corporate mercenaries, improbable weapons and roguish hackers all collide into rich, thrilling entertainment. Set across two volumes, these are stories that examine the near-now, extrapolating the most provocative trends into fascinating and plausible futures. 
 
We live in an increasingly Cyberpunk world, packed with complex technologies and globalised social trends. It is a world so bizarre that even the futurists couldn’t explain it – though many authors in this book have come closer than most. As both an introduction to the genre and the perfect compendium for the lifelong fan, The Big Book of Cyberpunk Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 offer more than a hundred ways to understand where we are, and where we’re going – or simply the opportunity to venture down dazzling, neon-slicked streets.

The Penguin Book of Murder Mysteries

A scintillating and unusual anthology of lost treasures from the timeless murder mystery genre 
 
For The Penguin Book of Murder Mysteries, writer and anthologist Michael Sims did not summon the usual suspects. He sought the unfamiliar, the unjustly forgotten, and little-known gems by writers from outside the genre. This historical tour of one of our most popular literary categories includes stories never-before reprinted, features rebellious early &quot;lady detectives&quot;, and spotlights former stars of the crime field. For twenty-first century connoisseurs of crime, The Penguin Books of Murder Mysteries celebrates how the nineteenth century added a fierce modern twist to the ancient theme of bloody murder.

Various

Hollie Starling

A masterful collection that captures the raw, unsettling essence of folk horror and its working-class roots

The working class understand horror, often sharing its postcode. They know about crossed knives on the tea-table, and hagstones, and the people in the puddles. Bog People is a thrilling cache of unearthed diamonds, black, brilliant and beautifully cut, none of them rough, born of the lower strata where the pressures are greater. Astonishing and long overdue, you really need to read this

Folk horror at its most feral and furious. Just as it should be

An absolute treat - a giddy tumble into wild and diverse British folk-horror. This feels like the countryside of my childhood, before every thatched cottage had a Mercedes in the driveway. It's raw, earthy (in every sense of the word) and darkly fun - you'll come away with dirt under your nails and woodlice in your hair

ADAM S LESLIE, author of Lost in the Garden

This collection is everything folk tales and folk horror should be. It's angry, disturbing, and shines a light on the obvious problems in society that mainstream media continues to ignore

Deeply unsettling and totally radical it tells of the horrors of our age in complex and haunting ways that will stay with the reader long into the future

A brilliant and eclectic collection of tales that illuminated all the darkest corners of my mind. I’m thrilled Bog People has lead me to find a selection of my new favourite writers

A Working-Class Anthology of Folk Horror

'A masterful collection' MAXINE PEAKE 
'Astonishing and long overdue, you really need to read this’ ALAN MOORE 
'An absolute treat' ADAM S. LESLIE 
 
Unleash the dark and delirious with this electrifying anthology of folk horror from some of Britain's most iconic working-class voices: A.K. Blakemore, Daniel Draper, Emma Glass, Mark Colbourne, Mark Stafford, Hollie Starling, Jenn Ashworth, Natasha Carthew, Salena Godden and Tom Benn. 
 
A phonograph cylinder that plays on a loop for eternity, casting out ghostly spectres of violence; a centuries-old stew made of severed body parts; a bigoted woman working at an ossuary, the bones she watches over her only remaining friends; three siblings who set out to scatter their father's ashes, a man none of them could stand; and a hag stone sitting in the pocket of a witch. 
 
Uncanny and unsettling, wild and wyrd, the ten stories in this collection showcase the best of folk horror. Set in and across England, they celebrate working-class culture and history, and, sharp as a guillotine blade, reveal the real monsters that stalk our green and pleasant land. 
 
'Deeply unsettling and totally radical' LALLY MACBETH, author of The Lost Folk 
'Everything folk tales and folk horror should be' TABITHA STANMORE, author of Cunning Folk 
'Feral and furious' CHARLIE COOPER

Various

Praise for Bog People

A masterful collection that captures the raw, unsettling essence of folk horror and its working-class roots

The working class understand horror, often sharing its postcode. They know about crossed knives on the tea-table, and hagstones, and the people in the puddles. Bog People is a thrilling cache of une ...

Folk horror at its most feral and furious. Just as it should be

A masterful collection that captures the raw, unsettling essence of folk horror and its working-class roots

The working class understand horror, often sharing its postcode. They know about crossed knives on the tea-table, and hagstones, and the people in the puddles. Bog People is a thrilling cache of une ...

Folk horror at its most feral and furious. Just as it should be

A masterful collection that captures the raw, unsettling essence of folk horror and its working-class roots

The working class understand horror, often sharing its postcode. They know about crossed knives on the tea-table, and hagstones, and the people in the puddles. Bog People is a thrilling cache of une ...

Folk horror at its most feral and furious. Just as it should be

Books by Various

Series by Various

Parallel Texts3 Books

Vintage Christmas Tales4 Books

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