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This short story by American author Mary E. Wilkins Freeman was first published in 1890. Considered by many to be a pre-feminist work, “The Revolt of ‘Mother’” addresses themes of domestic rebellion, self-assertion, the repression of women, and tradition in a male-dominated society. The narrative is often said to be autobiographic, and it shows Freeman’s complex attitudes about male and female relationships at the time it was written.The story beings as protagonist Sarah Penn, also... Read The Revolt Of Mother Summary

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The Rise of Silas Lapham is an 1885 Realist novel by William Dean Howells. The novel tells the story of Silas Lapham, who rises from poverty but struggles to grasp the social etiquette of elite American society. Howells is credited with establishing Realism as a literary genre in America. Realist novels such as The Rise of Silas Lapham were a response to the time period’s Sentimental novels, which Howells opposed. The novel explores themes of... Read The Rise of Silas Lapham Summary

The Road is a dystopian fiction novel published in 2006 by American author Cormac McCarthy. McCarthy penned 12 novels, three short stories, and several plays for screen and stage. His works, including Blood Meridian and No Country for Old Men, are known for violence; postapocalyptic, western settings, and a lack of punctuation characteristic of McCarthy's writing. Widely considered one of the greatest novels of the 21st century, The Road won the Pulitzer Prize and the... Read The Road Summary

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The Salt Eaters (1980) by Toni Cade Bambara is set in the fictional town of Claybourne, Georgia, in the late 1970s. The style of the novel is experimental and nonlinear. It follows stories and characters linked by themes more than plot. It moves between the past, present, and future in the minds and actions of different characters. The novel centers on the spiritual healing Velma receives from Minnie after a mental health crisis and spirals... Read The Salt Eaters Summary

First published in The Atlantic in 1960, James Hurst’s “The Scarlet Ibis” won the magazine’s “Atlantic First” award. Frequently included in literature anthologies, Hurst’s tragic short story explores themes of pride, shame, and death within the context of coming of age.This guide refers to the 1960 version that appeared in The Atlantic as well as the brief biographical information included in that original publication.Content Warning: The source text uses outdated, offensive terms to describe people... Read The Scarlet Ibis Summary

The Scarlet Letter is an 1850 novel by writer Nathaniel Hawthorne. The work, Hawthorne’s first full-length novel, is a classic of the American Romantic era. More specifically, its treatment of topics like sin, insanity, and the occult make it a work of Dark Romanticism—a movement related to the Gothic genre that includes works by Edgar Allan Poe and Herman Melville. The Scarlet Letter is also a piece of historical fiction; it is set in the... Read The Scarlet Letter Summary

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Book DetailThe Sea of Monsters, published by Miramax Books in 2006, is the second installment of Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson and the Olympians fantasy adventure series for young readers. The novel begins the summer after the first book in the series, The Lightning Thief, ends and follows returning heroes Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase on a quest to save Camp Half Blood. The Sea of Monsters was a New York Times best seller and Book... Read The Sea of Monsters Summary

Jack London’s novel The Sea-Wolf, originally published in 1904, draws inspiration from an ocean voyage London took in the Pacific nearly a decade prior to his writing the novel. London himself was an avid adventurer and once spent seven and a half months on the crew of the Sophia Sutherland. This study guide references the Signet Classics 2013 edition of The Sea-Wolf.Along with London’s other famous works, The Call of the Wild and White Fang... Read The Sea-Wolf Summary

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First published in the New Yorker in 1939, “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” is James Thurber’s short story about the flamboyant fantasy life of a timid suburban Everyman. A gentle satire of the human imagination (among other things), the story struck an immediate and lasting chord in the midcentury American imagination and is widely regarded as a comic masterpiece. Its distinctive mixture of pathos and parody made it one of the most anthologized short... Read The Secret Life of Walter Mitty Summary

Paul Beatty is the author of the 2015 novel The Sellout—a satire that makes fun of contemporary norms around race and identity. In the novel, Beatty applies his no-holds-barred idea of comedy to segregation, slavery, police brutality, and countless tragic and fraught issues that people typically treat with extreme seriousness and sensitivity. Through the main character, Me, the book provides an ironic and unexpected take on themes like Racial and Personal Identity and Capitalism’s Power... Read The Sellout Summary

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Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl is actually two separate (though interrelated) narratives: a short story set during the Holocaust, and a novella set roughly 40 years later in Miami, Florida. In the short story, also titled “The Shawl,” a young Jewish woman named Rosa Lublin is sent with her niece Stella and her infant daughter Magda to a concentration camp. Against all odds, Magda survives much longer than her mother expects, thanks largely to the shawl... Read The Shawl Summary