Each study guide includes essays, an in-depth chapter-by-chapter summary and analysis, character list, theme list, historical context, author biography and quiz. Study guides are available in PDF format.
The Wandering Fire is a fantasy novel written by Canadian writer Guy Gavriel Kay. It was published in 1986 as the second book in The Fionavar Tapestry trilogy following The Summer Tree (1984). It was followed by the final book The Darkest Road...
The Summer Tree is an epic fantasy novel written by Canadian writer Guy Gavriel Kay. It was published in 1984 by McClelland & Stewart. As part of The Fionavar Tapestry, it is the first book in the trilogy about the fictional realm of Fionavar....
Canadian author Guy Gavriel Kay's Lord of Emperors was published in 2000 and received incredibly positive reviews when it was released. In their review of the novel, Kirkus Review called the novel "essential reading for all Kay fans." The novel,...
It would be fair to say that Guy Gavriel Kay is one of the most prolific authors of fantasy. Sailing to Sarantium, Kay's seventh novel, was published in 1998. It is set against the backdrop of a looming conflict between the Eastern Roman Empire...
It would be fair to say that author Fritz Leiber is best-known for his adventures in the world of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. Swords in the Mist, Leiber's third novel in series published in 1968 by Ace Books, once again follows the aforementioned...
Fritz Leiber is one of the most prolific fantasy authors of the 20th century. His collection of short stories entitled Swords Against Death, which was published in 1970 by Ace Books, is one of the author's best-known and most interesting novels....
Originally published in 1970, Swords and Deviltry is a collection of tales by Fritz Lieber featuring his most famous characters, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. Lieber is the author who actually coined the term “sword and sorcery” for the fantasy...
Set in 1942 and published in 2017, Supriya Kelkar's novel Ahimsa received overwhelmingly positive reviews upon release. In their review of the novel, Kirkus Reviews wrote that "This 2015 New Visions Award winner offers a complex narrative and...
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid was published in 2017. It is Jenkins Reid's 5th novel, but her first work of historical fiction; her first 4 novels are generally considered to be part of the romance novel genre. The Seven...
Legend says that Macbeth was written in 1605 or 1606 and performed at Hampton Court in 1606 for King James I and his brother-in-law, King Christian of Denmark. Whether it was first performed at the royal court or was premiered at the Globe...
Released in 2001, O is a film directed by Tim Blake Nelson. Starring Mekhi Phifer, Josh Hartnett, Julia Stiles, and Elden Henson, the play had a budget of $5 million and raked in nearly $20 million at the box office. The rights to the film were...
The plot of Shakespeare's Othello is largely taken from Giraldi Cinthio's Gli Hecatommithi, a tale of love, jealousy, and betrayal; however, the characters, themes, and attitudes of the two works are vastly different, with Shakespeare's play being...
After establishing herself as one of the leading 20th-century poets in Canada, the publication of Surfacing in 1972 instantly confirmed Margaret Atwood’s status as one the country’s most important novelists. Atwood’s unnamed heroine goes into the...
The Candy House is a speculative fiction novel by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jennifer Egan, first published in 2022. The novel follows the intersecting lives of various characters in a series of stylistically diverse short stories as they...
“The Badger” is a poem by the English Romantic poet John Clare. It describes the traditional sport of “badger baiting,” in which a badger is captured and made to fight with dogs until it dies. The poem was published in 1820, as part of Clare’s...
“First Love” is a love poem by the English Romantic poet John Clare. Clare was born in 1793 in the small village of Helpstone. Before leaving school at the age of 12, he developed a love of poetry. His first book, Poems Descriptive of Rural Life...
Published in 1988, The Shadow Lines is a novel by award-winning Indian writer Amitav Ghosh. It recounts the story of the narrator's coming of age in Calcutta and the sweeping impact of political violence on his life.
The novel is told from a...
A Midsummer Night's Dream is first mentioned by Francis Meres in 1598, leading many scholars to date the play between 1594 and 1596. It is likely to have been written around the same period Romeo and Juliet was created. Indeed, many similarities...
"I Am!" laments the difficulty of asserting an individual identity in a hostile world. First published in 1848, it is one of the most famous poems by the nineteenth-century English poet John Clare. Clare was born in 1793 in a small village to...
The Aspern Papers is a novella by Henry James, first published serially in 1888 in The Atlantic Monthly. It was later released as a book in the same year. The novella explores an unnamed literary biographer's quest to obtain letters written...
Malorie is a post-apocalyptic novel written by American writer Josh Malerman. It was published in July 2021 by Del Rey Books. It is the sequel to Malerman’s debut novel Bird Box which was published in 2014.
In the first installment, an unknown and...
Although Escape from Hat, which was published in 2011, was written for a middle school audience, the graphic novel has gained a cult following from people of all ages. The novel tells the whimsical but dark story of dueling "lucky" rabbit (named...
True Spirit is an autobiography published by Jessica Watson in 2010.
In October 2009, Australian teenager Jessica Watson set out to circumnavigate the globe - one of the youngest people to ever try (and ultimately, the youngest person to succeed)....
The Shrinking of Treehorn is a children’s book written by American writer Florence Parry Heide. It was first published in 1971 with illustrations made by Edward Gorey. The book was followed by two sequels, Treehorn's Treasure in 1981 and ...
