The Importance of Being Earnest, a comedy, is Oscar Wilde’s final play. It premiered at St. James’ Theatre in London on February 14, 1895 and skewered the contemporary habits and attitudes of the British aristocracy. The opening was hugely successful, but Wilde’s ongoing conflict with the Marquess of Queensberry, his lover’s powerful father, led the play to close prematurely after Wilde was charged with “gross indecency” for having sex with men. Despite this setback, The... Read The Importance of Being Earnest Summary

In 1867, the San Francisco Alta Californian assigned its 31-year-old reporter Mark Twain to cover a steamboat pleasure trip to the Mediterranean. Twain’s account of the trip was published in 1869 as The Innocents Abroad, or The New Pilgrim’s Progress. The book would become the most popular and bestselling work of Twain’s career, acclaimed by both critics and readers. Twain’s travelogue chronicles a voyage through Europe and the Holy Land attended by a group of... Read The Innocents Abroad Summary

Mark Twain’s short story “The Invalid’s Story,” published in his 1882 collection The Stolen White Elephant, Etc., is a tall tale involving a mix-up between a coffin and a box full of guns. Traveling on a train with what he believes to be the coffin, the first-person narrator mistakes the odor of pungent cheese for that of the decaying corpse. Disparaged by critics for its crudeness at its time of publication, the story deals with... Read The Invalid's Story Summary

The Juvie Three (2008) is a young adult novel by Gordon Korman. It is a unique coming-of-age story about personal transformation and found family, and a commentary on the stigmas that often burden those held back by their pasts. Korman challenges these societal perceptions and shows that we all have the power to change. This study guide references the 2008 paperback edition from Hyperion Books.Plot SummaryGraham Fosse, known as “Gecko,” drives a stolen getaway car... Read The Juvie Three Summary

The Kaiju Preservation Society is a kaiju science fiction novel written by American science fiction author John Scalzi and published by Tor Books in 2022. The novel follows Jamie Gray, a Manhattan delivery driver who, during the COVID-19 pandemic, gets a job at an animal rights organization caring for kaiju on an alternate Earth. The novel explores themes of The Importance of Conservation and Environmental Stewardship, Humans’ Impact on Ecosystems, and Teamwork and Community in... Read The Kaiju Preservation Society Summary

The Kid Who Ran for President by Dan Gutman (Scholastic, 1996) follows a 12-year-old boy as he campaigns to become the next president of the United States. In 2016, John Oliver presented a segment on Last Week Tonight, where he compared the book to the Trump campaign. Gutman is the author of over 70 books for kids and young adults, including the Baseball Card Adventures series, the My Weird School series, and the Million Dollar... Read The Kid Who Ran for President Summary

The Landry News is a young adult novel by Andrew Clements, published in 1998. It centers on a school newspaper and the lives it touches, the lessons it teaches, and the power it gives people to stand up for their beliefs. The book received the William Allen White Children's Book Award in 2002 and has been translated into five languages. American author Andrew Clements (1949-2019) penned many books for young readers, including his most famous work, Frindle... Read The Landry News Summary

The Last Devil to Die (2023) is a cozy murder mystery novel by Richard Osman. It is the fourth book in Osman’s Thursday Murder Club series, which follows a group of pensioners living in a retirement community in South England who meet each week to solve mysteries. The group often have a connection to their cases, sometimes personal and sometimes geographical, and they tend to uncover ancillary mysteries throughout their investigations. The preceding three books... Read The Last Devil to Die Summary

The Last Kids on Earth—a New York Times bestseller and winner of the Texas Bluebonnet Award, which is determined by the popular vote of grade school students throughout Texas—is a post-apocalypse graphic novel for young readers, filled with illustrations, humor, friendship, and zombie survival. The story is written by Max Brallier and drawn by Douglas Holgate, and was originally published in 2015, but has since gone on to become a seven-book series; this is the... Read The Last Kids on Earth Summary

Published by Viking in 2023, The Last Kids on Earth and the Monster Dimension is the ninth installment in the New York Times best-selling middle grade Last Kids on Earth series by Max Brallier, illustrated by Douglas Holgate. Brallier, the author of more than 30 books, has an extensive background in storytelling, including a role as a game designer for Poptropica, an educational website created by fellow author Jeff Kinney. Before focusing on middle grade... Read The Last Kids on Earth and the Monster Dimension Summary

The Last Kids on Earth: The Zombie Parade (2016) is a middle grade, illustrated novel by Max Brallier. It is the second entry in The Last Kids on Earth series, which follows 13-year-old Jack Sullivan and a few of his classmates as they attempt to survive a "Monster Apocalypse” and face off against a series of increasingly dangerous antagonists. Jack, Quint, June, and Dirk try to unravel the mystery behind the disappearing zombies while undertaking... Read The Last Kids on Earth and the Zombie Parade Summary

The Last Straw, published by Amulet Books in 2009, is an illustrated middle grade novel by Jeff Kinney and the third installation in the best-selling Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. The series follows the everyday life of middle schooler Greg Heffley as he writes in his diary and illustrates his adventures, reflecting Kinney’s signature humorous cartoon style. Diary of a Wimpy Kid has grown into a media franchise with multiple film and television adaptations... Read The Last Straw Summary

The Librarianist (2023) by Patrick deWitt tells the story of elderly Bob Comet, a retired librarian and eccentric. When Bob unexpectedly encounters a lost resident of a senior center, he stumbles into an opportunity to volunteer at the center—a life change that brings about a series of surprises and ultimately restores his connection with others. The Librarianist is deWitt’s fifth novel. He wrote the screenplay for the feature film Terri, which was presented at the... Read The Librarianist Summary

The Lieutenant of Inishmore, a play by Martin McDonagh, was first produced in 2001 by the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon before moving to the Garrick Theatre in London’s West End. In 2006, the play premiered Off-Broadway (winning the Obie and Lortel Awards) and then on Broadway, where it won a Tony nomination for Best Play. McDonagh is a British-Irish playwright and screenwriter who is well-known for his absurdist, farcical, black-comedy style and his early... Read The Lieutenant of Inishmore Summary

The Life and Crimes of Hoodie Rosen is the debut novel by Jewish American author Isaac Blum. The novel follows an Orthodox Jewish teenager whose growing community faces resistance and antisemitism in their town, Tregaron. Hoodie’s friendship with a non-Jewish girl named Anna-Marie (who happens to be the daughter of Tregaron’s antisemitic mayor) causes trouble for both of their communities. Major themes in the novel include The Role of Community in Maintaining Faith, The Importance... Read The Life and Crimes of Hoodie Rosen Summary

The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman is a nine-volume novel published between 1759 and 1767 by English novelist Laurence Sterne. The novel is considered by many scholars as an early forerunner of postmodern literature due to its metafictional commentary on its own narrative. Contemporary critics did not view the novel favorably, though its humor and sentimentalism helped it find an audience. The novel has been adapted for radio and opera and as a... Read The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman Summary

Published in 1986, The Light Fantastic is the second novel in Sir Terry Pratchett’s iconic Discworld series of comic fantasy novels. The book is a direct sequel to The Color of Magic (1983), picking up immediately after the inept wizard Rincewind and the naive tourist Twoflower fall off the edge of their flat world. Saved by cosmic intervention, the pair are pursued across the Discworld by various factions seeking one of the world’s eight most... Read The Light Fantastic Summary

Martha Andersson, a 79-year-old resident of Diamond House, a retirement home in Stockholm, dreams of robbing a bank. She wakes to grim reality: Since new owners took over the home, the kitchen has been axed, meals arrive under cellophane, and cost-cutting has stripped away nearly every comfort. Martha resolves to change things but knows she cannot act alone.She gathers her four closest friends from their choir group, The Vocal Chord. Rake (Bertil Engström) is a... Read The Little Old Lady Who Broke All the Rules Summary

The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven is a collection of 24 loosely connected short stories by writer Sherman Alexie; all are set on or near the Spokane Reservation in Washington state. As a Salish descendant (his mother was of Spokane heritage and his father of Coeur d’Alene) and celebrated author, Alexie has become a mouthpiece for Northwestern American Indigenous tribes. Two stories cut from the original 1993 publication have been reinserted in the... Read The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven Summary

Andrew Clements’s penultimate middle-grade novel, The Losers Club, was released in 2017 and follows the protagonist Alec Spencer as he balances his love of reading with his real-life responsibilities, all while facing off against his former-friend-turned-bully. This novel is one of many school stories written by Andrew Clements, and it explores the themes of reading, friendship, and misconceptions.This study guide references the paperback 2018 Yearling first edition of the novel.Plot SummaryOn the first day of... Read The Losers Club Summary