Tareq's bookshelf: all en-US Fri, 15 Feb 2013 12:43:27 -0800 60 Tareq's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Bridge to Terabithia 2839
That's not a very promising beginning for a friendship, but Jess and Leslie Burke become inseparable. Together they create Terabithia, a magical kingdom in the woods where the two of them reign as king and queen, and their imaginations set the only limits.]]> 128 Katherine Paterson 0439366771 Tareq 5 3.99 1977 Bridge to Terabithia
author: Katherine Paterson
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1977
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Bridge to Terabithia: The Official Movie Companion]]> 2841 48 David Paterson 0061215317 Tareq 4 4.06 2006 Bridge to Terabithia: The Official Movie Companion
author: David Paterson
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2006
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/02/15
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]]> <![CDATA[أسطورة حامل الضياء - الجزء الثاني]]> 17284326 191 أحمد خالد توفيق Tareq 4 4.00 2013 أسطورة حامل الضياء - الجزء الثاني
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2013
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/02/03
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]]> آخر الدنيا 5977698 مجموعة قصصية 181 Yusuf Idris Tareq 4 3.87 1961 آخر الدنيا
author: Yusuf Idris
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1961
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/02/01
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]]> The Stone Raft 29565
In Saramago's lovely fable, the new island is sent spinning, like a great stone raft, towards the Azores. While the authorities panic and tourists and investors flee, three men, two women and a dog are drawn together by portents that burden them with a bemusing sense of responsibility. Travelling at first packed into a car, then into a wagon, they take to the road to explore the limits of their now finite land, adrift in a world made new by this radical shift in perspective.]]> 272 José Saramago 1860467210 Tareq 4 3.84 1986 The Stone Raft
author: José Saramago
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1986
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/31
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]]> Seeing 47667
But when the ballots are counted, more than 70 percent are blank. The citizens are rebellious. A state of emergency is declared. But are the authorities acting too precipitously? Or even blindly? The word evokes terrible memories of the plague of blindness that hit the city four years before, and of the one woman who kept her sight. Could she be behind the blank ballots? A police superintendent is put on the case.

What begins as a satire on governments and the sometimes dubious efficacy of the democratic system turns into something far more sinister. A singular novel from the author of Blindness.]]> 307 José Saramago Tareq 4 3.78 2004 Seeing
author: José Saramago
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2004
rating: 4
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]]> Blindness 2526 No food, no water, no government, no obligation, no order.

Discover a chillingly powerful and prescient dystopian vision from one of Europe's greatest writers.

A driver waiting at the traffic lights goes blind. An ophthalmologist tries to diagnose his distinctive white blindness, but is affected before he can read the textbooks.
It becomes a contagion, spreading throughout the city. Trying to stem the epidemic, the authorities herd the afflicted into a mental asylum where the wards are terrorised by blind thugs. And when fire destroys the asylum, the inmates burst forth and the last links with a supposedly civilised society are snapped.

This is not anarchy, this is blindness.

‘Saramago repeatedly undertakes to unite the pressing demands of the present with an unfolding vision of the future. This is his most apocalyptic, and most optimistic, version of that project yet� Independent]]> 326 José Saramago Tareq 5 4.04 1995 Blindness
author: José Saramago
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1995
rating: 5
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]]> حادثة شرف 5736034 1- محطة
2- شيخوخة بدون جنون
3- طبلية من السماء
4- اليد الكبيرة
5- تحويد العروسة
6- حادثة شرف
7- سرُّه الباتع]]> 166 Yusuf Idris Tareq 5 3.89 1958 حادثة شرف
author: Yusuf Idris
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1958
rating: 5
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date added: 2013/01/31
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]]> <![CDATA[أسطورة حامل الضياء - الجزء الأول]]> 17259945 206 أحمد خالد توفيق Tareq 4 3.96 2013 أسطورة حامل الضياء - الجزء الأول
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2013
rating: 4
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date added: 2013/01/31
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]]> السنجة 16076787 في الصفحات التالية سوف نقوم بعمل بطولي. نحاول أن نعرف سر اختفاء المدعو عصام الشرقاوي. هذا يقتضي أن نبحث كثيرًا جدًّا إلى أن نجد خيطًا، وربما لا نجد.]]> 266 أحمد خالد توفيق 9992195746 Tareq 2 3.25 2012 السنجة
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.25
book published: 2012
rating: 2
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]]> The Lovely Bones 12232938
So begins the story of Susie Salmon, who is adjusting to her new home in heaven, a place that is not at all what she expected, even as she is watching life on earth continue without her -- her friends trading rumors about her disappearance, her killer trying to cover his tracks, her grief-stricken family unraveling. Out of unspeakable tragedy and loss, The Lovely Bones succeeds, miraculously, in building a tale filled with hope, humor, suspense, even joy.]]> 372 Alice Sebold 0316166685 Tareq 0 to-read 3.87 2002 The Lovely Bones
author: Alice Sebold
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2002
rating: 0
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date added: 2011/08/09
shelves: to-read
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]]> انقلاب 6382990 � من اغتـال رئيس جمهـورية ( باراجـواى ) ؟.. وكيف تورط ( أدهم ) فى هذا الأمر ؟!
� تُرى هل يمكن أن ينجو ( أدهم ) من هذا المـأزق ، أم أنه يحتاج إلى ( انقلاب ) ؟!]]> 284 نبيل فاروق Tareq 4 3.75 1999 انقلاب
author: نبيل فاروق
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.75
book published: 1999
rating: 4
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date added: 2010/11/15
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]]> أوتار الماء 5639869
"لايعرف احد انه يتسلل بين الحين والحين الى تلك الشرفة ليخبئ فيها قارورة عطر صغيرة مما يستطيع استخلاصة , يخفيها وراء ظهر الميكروويف ويتركها مفتوحة , لعل روحا هائمة من ارواح المغدورين الكثر فى هذا العالم تجئ ... وتنهل مما يتاح لها من اريج"
ĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶĶ

كتب صلاح فضل
عن المجموعة القصصية بجريدة الاهرام
هو مبدع دقيق وباهرتوهمت يوم ان قرات له منذ قرابه عقدين من الزمان مجموعته القصصيه�'� الموت يضحك�'� انه يعيد سيره يوسف ادريس في هجر الطب وعشق القصه الغاويه لكنه لم يلبث ان وقع في غوايه انكي وافدح ترك مصر وطار علي اجنحه مجله العربي الكويتيه الي مختلف بقاع المعموره شرقا و غربا وعندما انتثر عطره في الصحافه المصوره الانيقه ونجا من تراب القاهره الرمادي خشيت ان يضيع اسمه من ذاكره قرائها المولعين بالنسيان بحيث لا يصبح مرشحا لملء فراغ العبقري الجامح الذي كثيرا ما صرخ دفاعا عن الحريه والثقافه حتي لكان يوسف ادريس قد ارتحل معه مره اخري لكن في اعاره عربيه�!� غير اني اصطدمت بمجموعته الاخيره�'� اوتار الماء�'� فنبهتني الي حقيقه بديهيه وان كانت مدهشه لا يمكن للتجارب العظمي ان تتكرر ولا للشخصيات الفذه ان تستنسخ فلكل زمان مبدعوه وقاماته ولا تجوز المقارنات المبنيه علي مشابه سطحيه خاصه ابان فوره التحولات التي شملت كل شئ�.� لقد اختمرت تجارب محمد المخزنجي الفنيه في مواطن ثقافيه عربيه وعالميه مغايره لمن قبله وعثر علي ايقاعاته المميزه وهو يعزف علي الوتر الانساني بكل عذوبته وصفائه وما جعله يحقق درجه عاليه من شعريه السرد ليس شبهه بيوسف ادريس بل اختلافه الجذري عنه فلم تعد حروب الايديولوجيا هي منطلق كتابه اليوم ولا مناوشه السلطه والاحتماء بها تاره والتربص بها تاره اخري هي ما يصنع قامات المبدعين الكبارانقضي عهد السرديات الجماعيه الكبري في تاريخ الثقافه ودخلت الي منطقه الفولكلور واصبح علي كل فنان ان يصنع عالمه ورويته ويبتكر منظوره للحياه وتصوره للمستقبل بمعزل عما يريده الاخرون منه�.�

كثيرا ما اجدني عند قراءه مجموعه قصصيه مدفوعا الي التماس الخطوط الواصله بينها متمنيا اندماجها في نسيج روائي متعدد الشرائح لان كل قطعه منها لا تشبع احساس القارئ باستدارتها واكتمالها واستقلالها عما يحف بها من اجزاء عندئذ يدرك ان صاحبها لا يمتلك موهبه الخراط المحترف ولا يعرف كيف يكور مخلوقاته التامه بنعومه كافيه�.� لان سر القصه القصيره انها تولد مكتمله كالطفله التي لا تحتاج الي مزيد من الاعضاء لا يمكن مطها او اختزالها او ادماجها في مخلوق اخر�.� قليل جدا من كتاب السرد من يحقق هذا الشرط الجمالي الموسس للقصه القصيره ومنهم كاتبنا الموهوب�.� فمجموعه�'� اوتار الماء�'� تضم عشر قطع�.� لا تتداخل ولا تتخارج كانها مجره فلكيه من النجوم الصغيره المتناغمه لكل منها تجربته وتقنياته ودلالته�.� ربما كانت مفارقه الربط بين الاطراف المتباعده هي التي تعطي مسحه رهيفه من الاتساق علي منظومتها الكليه او كان البحث عن الظواهر اللامرئيه وشغف السوال عن السر الكامن خلف الخوارق هو التيار الدافئ الذي يجعلها ذات حراره حميمه متقاربه لكن كلا منها يظل ثمره شهيه لها نكهتها الخاصه تبث في روحك شعورا بالاكتمال بعد قراءتها يدعوك الي التريث في مطالعه غيرها حتي تستجمع قدرتك علي بدايه شئ جديد�.�

ولناخذ مثالا علي ذلك قصته الاولي�'� تلك الحياه الفاتنه�'� التي يخاطب فيها الراوي قرينته بعد رويته لحادثه صغيره دهست فيها السياره قطه فراها مكومه تحت العجل وراها في اللحظه ذاتها تفر ناجيه يقول�'� اعرف يا سكني ان احدا لن يصدقني مثلك واعرف ان تصديقك لي ليس مماشاه مجنون تحبينه لكنه تصديق شريكك في الايمان بان الكون من حولنا ملئ بالمدهشات التي لم نعرف قوانينها فنسميها معجزات او خوارق واعرف انك طيبه الي درجه الفرح بكل معجزه شجيه لهذا لن اخون طيبتك تلك وسابسط بين يديك بامانه تفسيري لتلك الرويه التي تكشفت لي وانا في الطريق اليك بعد نجاتك من الموت مرتين مره من النزيف الداخلي ومره من الجراحه الكبري التي استاصلوا فيها جزءا من داخلك�..� بقوانين عالمنا المحسوس يا سكني اندفعت القطه فدهستها عجلات السياره لكن بحسابات الروح وبما كانت فيه من فرح اللعب ثم في مواجهه المباغته الخئون للخطر الداهم قفزت قفزه الحياه في وجه الموت فنجت�.'‏ويرب� الفنان هذه الرويه المزدوجه للزمن وللاشياء بما يراه في نهر الشارع من اناس دهستهم الحياه مرتين لكنهم انتفضوا كي يواصلوا المسير مما يقدم لمحه بارقه من حكمه سيروره الوجود في ظل هذه اللحظه الكاشفه واذا كانت هذه دلاله القصه فان مشهدها الوصفي وسطورها التحليليه وما تعبق به من عطر المشاعر وحركه الالتفاتات وحيويه المواقف تجعل لقراءتها متعه لا تغني عنها هذه الفقرات المفصوله عن سياقها الدافق�.�

حقيبه بلون الشفق
في هذه القصه الاخري يطلعنا المخزنجي علي بعض اسراره الابداعيه عندما توقف في متحف�'� تشيخوف�'� بروسيا امام�'� خزانه نحيله من خشب البلوط لها واجهه كامله من البللور الصافي وما ان نظرت الي الرف الاوسط حتي�..� انذهلت�.� تسمرت امام الخزانه التي كان يستعملها تشيخوف لحفظ ادواته الطبيه محدقا جاحظ العينين�..� كانت حقيبه صفراء برتقاليه حقيبه من جلد الغزال يا محمد تماما تشبه الحقيبه التي حلمت بها منذ ثلاثين سنه وكانت سببا لصدام جنوني مع امي المسكينه وسببا لاكتشاف لعله هو الذي مازال يبقيني علي قيد الحياه�.� ان هذه التزامنات هذه التوافقات الغامضه بين اشياء متباعده هذه التجليات تذهب بلبي�'‏نلاح� اولا تطابق الراوي مع شخصيه القاص في الاسم والمهنه والمشاعر والهموم الشخصيه والمهنيه مما يضاعف من شعور القرب الحميم من التجربه الصادقه في هذا الجزء والممهده بدورها لتصديق الجزء الاشد وعوره فيها فالصبي قد الح علي امه ان تقتني له حقيه من جلد الغزال فردت عليه قائله�'� يا سلام غالي والطلب رخيص�..� اول ما يبيض الديك يا نن عيني�'� وبهذه الكلمات تفجرت المشكله فقد جن جنون الصبي واخذ يمزق حقائبه مدركا سخريه امه به ثم امسك بالسكين وصعد الي سطح بيتهم حيث عشه الطيور كان في العاشره من عمره حينئذ اي ثلاث سنوات بعد بدايه القدره علي التجريد كما يقول الراوي بدايه الفصل ما بين التخييلي والحلمي والواقعي قبل ذلك يتعامل الاطفال مع هذه الاشياء علي قدم المساواه�.� بعدها لا يحدث ذلك الا في حاله الجنون�:'� كنت ابكي ابكي بتوحش وقد قبضت علي الديك وانا راكع وهو بين ركبتي ويدي اليسري بينما كانت اليمني ترفع السكين اما ان يضع البيضه او اخرجها من داخله�.‏لحظ� بدات هياجي كان ذلك لادراكي ان امي تسخر مني�.� وبعد ذلك ادركت ان بيضه الديك الذهبيه التي يضعها مره في العمر ما هي الا بيضه الحكايات السحريه ايقنت انها حقيقيه وموجوده في احشاء الديك الممسوك بين ركبتي ويدي والسكين�'� ثم يصف تلك اللحظات العجيبه لينتهي منها الي حاله نورانيه خالصه حيث اخذ الديك يشف وينفش ريشه ويتالق بالوان زاهيه كانه قد اصبح من زجاج حي ملون�'� وفي قلب الزيغ اللوني داخله اخذت شمس صغيره تولد�..� تشتعل بلون ذهبي هادئ�..� وما ان تحركت انا حركه يسيره حتي اختلفت زاويه النظر�..� وتبينت دحو هذه الشمس الصفراء�..� كانت لحظه مثل السرنمه�(!)� تلك التي تلت هذا التجلي�.� ولم استطع عبر ثلاثين عاما ان اتذكر غير اني ذهبت
الي مكان ودفنت فيه هذا السر المتوهج وبخبره هذا البعد الغائر من الزمن بحكمه هذا الموروث اتخذت قراري فلا بوح ولا بيع�..� اته سريسري وحدي�'.�
اما الحقيبه التي ترقد في خزانه�'� تشيخوف�'� فان الراوي علي استعداد لان يقسم انها الحقيبه ذاتها التي حلم بها يوما وقاده حلمه الي اكتشاف ما اكتشف�.�
�'‏وانن� بمقدار يقيني من وحده الكون لا اشك لحظه في ان بارقا برق لسبب ما في الوجود يوم كنت في العاشره ونقل الي ذهني الحالم صوره تلك الحقيبه النائمه في خزنه ذات واجهه زجاجيه علي بعد الاف الاميال في اقاصي قاره بعيده�'.� اما القارئ الذي لا يريد تصديق هذه الخوارق العجيبه فحسبه ان يفترض قصه لتشيخوف قراها هذا الصبي المفتون بالسرد منذ طفولته ولمعت في ذهنه من اوصافها صوره حقيبه جلد الغزال الثمينه حتي يستقر ضميره علي سبب معقول�.�

رنين اوتار الماء
يبدو ان هذه المجموعه القصصيه تتمحور حول الغرائب التي جمعها محمد المخزنجي في جولاته البعيده�.� خاصه في اقصي المشرق واحالها الي لحظات ابداعيه خارقه لا تكاد تخلو واحده منها مما يدهش ويتجاوز حدود العقل ويقف بالراوي علي حافه الجنون�.� ولانه راو اليف ووديع فهو دائما يحدث نفسه او يحدثك كمخاطب في تخاطر موصول�.� والقصه التي اعطت المجموعه عنوانها�'� اوتار الماء�'� تستحق ان نتريث عندها لانها دفعت الكاتب الي اختيار فقره من احد الكتب العلميه وتصدير المجموعه بها تدور حول اثر الرنين�'� الذي ينبعث من اصوات بعض مغنيات الاوبرا�'� السوبرانو�'� بالغه النقاء والقوه ممن يستطعن باصواتهن تهشيم كووس البللور بفعل الرنين وهو محاوله الماده للاهتزاز توافقا مع موجه صوتيه عاليه الطاقه تجعل الزجاج يرج نفسه بعنف حتي يتحول الي نثار كيما ينجز هذا التوافق وكانه تحول الي اوتار عديده يتجاوب كل منها مع موجه الصوت الحافز�'.�
اما القصه فتحكي تفاصيل لقاء عارض بالصدفه بين الراوي الذي هاجر الي تخوم المعموره في كمبوديا علي حافه الغابه العذراء التي منحته وحدها السكينه وعمل دليلا سياحيا لها كي يدرا عنها هجوم المتطفلين علي مساربها الخفيه ثم يلتقي بعد خمسه عشر عاما بطبيبه الذي عرض عليه حالته في قسم الامراض النفسيه والعصبيه بمستشفي المنصوره والذي لم يتعرف عليه مما جعله يكتب له رساله هي هذه القصه دون ان يختلف شكل الرساله عن نمط الكتابه القصصيه في المجموعه يقول فيها�:-�

�'� اتذكرك بشده فانت طبيب من اثنين بين عشرات الاطباء الذين عرضت عليهم حالتي ووضعتما احتمالا مختلفا لتفسير الاعراض التي كنت انا نفسي اظنها بوادر جنون كانت حاله مدهشه لرجل لا يستحم ولا يغتسل و يمتنع عن الطعام اكتئابا عندما تمطر الرجل الذي اعتاد مع انطلاق الماء من صنبور او اي مصدر اخر ان يسمع بكاء اطفال وعويل نسوه وانتحاب رجال واصوات مبهمه صارخه تتلاحق مفزعه�.� كلهم شخصوا حالتي ضمن دائره الفصام وقالوا عن الاعراض انها هلاوس سمعيه�.� وقد سالتني انت مره السوال الذي لم يوجهه لي طبيب اخر�:� وماذا تظن حالتك كيف يمكن ان تفسرها يومها لم يكن لدي تفسير لكنني كنت متيقنا انها ليست هلاوس�.� انها اصوات حقيقيه اسمعها وان لم انجح في تحديد مصدرها انذاك�.� لكن خاطرا عابرا اضاء لي فجاه واحسست انني اعثر علي تفسير لم يقل به احد لكنه ينبع من قوانين الفيزياء البسيطه�.� انت تعرف ان الصوت موجات من تضاغط وخلخله في الهواء�.� وتراكيب تنطلق من حولنا ولا تختفي او تتبدد كما يظن معظم الناس�.� وانها طاقه تبقي وتتخذ لها مكامن تتناسب مع قوتها وحيزها المضغوط حتي يتم استدعاوها�..� وهنا لب مسالتي فالماء عندما يخرج مضغوطا بقوه من ثقوب�'� الدش�'� الرفيعه او من مصفاه صنبور الحوض او بجذب كتله الارض لزخات المطر الماء في هذه الحالات يغدو كاوتار مشددوه قابله للاهتزاز باصغر نسمه هواء فتستدعي بذبذباتها اصوات الصراخ والبكاء والعويل والنحيب والفزع يستقبلها سمعي دون بقيه خلق الله لخلل او ميزه في هذا السمع�'.�

لذلك لم يجد الراوي مكانا يضمن له سكينه النفس وهدوء الاصوات سوي علي حافه خليج تايلاند حيث الغابات المطيره والنباتات الكثيفه والطيور الطليقه وبقيه قبائل معزوله ومتناثره تعيش علي الفطره في سلام الغابه�.� يحيون علي جمع الثمار البريه وصيد السمك من الجداول الشفافه في وهاد الخضره عاش بينهم وتزوج احدي بناتهم واخذ ينشد للطبيعه الصافيه العذبه ولما وراءها من اسرار�.� وهنا تتجلي رويه محمد المخزنجي الذي برئ من الايديولوجيا واخلص للعلم والفن واتخذ من الادب مهجرا يفتح له اسرار خزائن الوجود الانساني واعماقه الغائره وموسيقاه في تخالفاتها وتوافقاتها التي تهتز لها حركه الحياه البشريه دون ان تتحطم�.‏]]> 116 محمد المخزنجي 9770187771 Tareq 5 3.80 2002 أوتار الماء
author: محمد المخزنجي
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2002
rating: 5
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date added: 2010/11/07
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]]> جمهورية فرحات 6380570 104 Yusuf Idris Tareq 4 3.52 1956 جمهورية فرحات
author: Yusuf Idris
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.52
book published: 1956
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2010/07/06
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]]> قاع المدينة 5736322 مجموعة قصص قصيرة 143 Yusuf Idris Tareq 0 to-read 3.73 1986 قاع المدينة
author: Yusuf Idris
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.73
book published: 1986
rating: 0
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date added: 2009/09/29
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]]> العسكري الأسود 5956896 87 Yusuf Idris 9771100025 Tareq 4 3.74 1982 العسكري الأسود
author: Yusuf Idris
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.74
book published: 1982
rating: 4
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]]> لغة الآي آي 5977699 149 Yusuf Idris 9773164896 Tareq 4 3.67 1965 لغة الآي آي
author: Yusuf Idris
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1965
rating: 4
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date added: 2009/09/29
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]]> النداة 5977703 مجموعة قصصية 168 Yusuf Idris Tareq 0 to-read 3.63 1970 النداة
author: Yusuf Idris
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.63
book published: 1970
rating: 0
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date added: 2009/09/29
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]]> الحرام 5735513 144 Yusuf Idris Tareq 0 to-read 3.98 1959 الحرام
author: Yusuf Idris
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1959
rating: 0
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date added: 2009/09/29
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]]> بيت من لحم 5974527 مجموعة قصصية 137 Yusuf Idris 9771100033 Tareq 4 3.84 1971 بيت من لحم
author: Yusuf Idris
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1971
rating: 4
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]]> العيب 5735622 Alalem Books حصريا من كتب العالم
شاهد متجرنا لمزيد من الكتب العربية
هذا هو الرابط المباشر للمتجر
]]> 111 Yusuf Idris 9771104241 Tareq 4 3.64 1962 العيب
author: Yusuf Idris
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.64
book published: 1962
rating: 4
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date added: 2009/09/29
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]]> أسطورة آكل البشر 6004850 116 أحمد خالد توفيق Tareq 3 3.92 1998 أسطورة آكل البشر
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1998
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2009/09/28
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]]> أسطورة النداة 6004838 126 أحمد خالد توفيق Tareq 3 3.87 1998 أسطورة النداة
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1998
rating: 3
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date added: 2009/09/28
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]]> أسطورة إيجور 6006822 112 أحمد خالد توفيق Tareq 5 4.00 2001 أسطورة إيجور
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2009/09/28
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]]> أسطورة الكلمات السبع 6011765 156 أحمد خالد توفيق Tareq 3 3.97 2004 أسطورة الكلمات السبع
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2004
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2009/09/28
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]]> شيء من حتى 6019878 إنها اكبر من ذلك و أشد خطرا..إنها مواجهة (سيبوبه) مع (الكسائي)..إن كنت لا تعرف الثاني فلتقرأ هذا الكتيب..أما إن كنت لا تعرف الاول فرأيي هو...إحم...!]]> 143 أحمد خالد توفيق 9773781941 Tareq 5 4.35 2008 شيء من حتى
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2008
rating: 5
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]]> أسطورة البيت 6004920 128 أحمد خالد توفيق Tareq 4 3.90 1999 أسطورة البيت
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1999
rating: 4
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date added: 2009/09/28
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]]> حكايات التاروت 6005011 190 أحمد خالد توفيق Tareq 4 4.13 2001 حكايات التاروت
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2001
rating: 4
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date added: 2009/09/28
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]]> أسطورة بعد منتصف الليل 6011733 240 أحمد خالد توفيق Tareq 5 4.21 2002 أسطورة بعد منتصف الليل
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2002
rating: 5
read at:
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]]> حلقة الرعب 6004909 199 أحمد خالد توفيق Tareq 4 4.25 1999 حلقة الرعب
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1999
rating: 4
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]]> يوتوبيا 3503947 لقد عزَلَ الأغنياء أنفسهم في (يوتوبيا) الساحل الشمالي تحت حراسة المارينز الأمريكيين، يتعاطون المخدرات ويمارسون المتع المحرمة إلى أقصاها، بينما ينسحق الفقراء خارجها ينهش بعضهم لحم بعض من أجل العيش، دونما كهرباء أو صرف صحي أو رعاية طبية من أي نوع. ولكن حين يتسلل الراوي وصديقته (جرمينال) خارج (يوتوبيا) بدافع الملل وبحثا عن (صيد بشري)
مناسب يحدث ما يهدد الوضع المستقر بالانفجار.

فيما يشبه هول علامات يوم القيامة، تدق هذه الرواية المثيرة ناقوس الخطر، تكاد تشك إذ تنهيها أهي بالفعل رواية متخيلة، أم إن كاتبها تسلل من المستقبل القريب لينقل لك هوله بحياد مذهل؟]]> 192 أحمد خالد توفيق 9773513912 Tareq 5 3.94 2009 يوتوبيا
author: أحمد خالد توفيق
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2009
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Something Borrowed (Darcy & Rachel, #1)]]> 42156 Something Borrowed tells the story of Rachel, a young attorney living and working in Manhattan.

Rachel has always been the consummate good girl—until her thirtieth birthday, when her best friend, Darcy, throws her a party. That night, after too many drinks, Rachel ends up in bed with Darcy's fiancé. Although she wakes up determined to put the one-night fling behind her, Rachel is horrified to discover that she has genuine feelings for the one guy she should run from. As the September wedding date nears, Rachel knows she has to make a choice. In doing so, she discovers that the lines between right and wrong can be blurry, endings aren't always neat, and sometimes you have to risk all to win true happiness.

Something Borrowed is a phenomenal debut novel that will have you laughing, crying, and calling your best friend.
]]> 336 Emily Giffin 031232118X Tareq 0 to-read 3.89 2004 Something Borrowed (Darcy & Rachel, #1)
author: Emily Giffin
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2004
rating: 0
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]]> Mr. Maybe 31101
Mr. Maybe is the tale of her heartfelt but hilarious deliberation, irresistibly chronicled by bestselling author Jane Green. On one hand, Nick makes up for his low bank-account balance by his performance in the sack, or in the bathtub, as the case may be. But life with him means little more than nightly trips to the bar, a dark and grungy apartment, and plenty of dull political tirades to boot. But those blue eyes, and that tender heart...

On the other hand, there's Ed, whose luxurious house and gargantuan bank account are quite tempting to the starving Libby. But his unsavory mustache and bumbling ways make Libby wonder if the platinum AMEX and unlimited "retail therapy" are worth it. He may have fallen in love with her at first sight, but nothing seems to solve his lackluster performance in the sack � even speed reading The Joy of Sex. When the diamond shopping commences, Libby is forced to realize that the time for "maybe" is up.

Taking romantic comedy to a hip, sparkling new level, Mr. Maybe is a classic tale of what happens to one girl when her heart and her head aren't looking for the same thing. With a laugh and minute and a heroine whose struggles in the dating jungle will remind you of your own, Mr. Maybe is a story that all will leave you smitten.]]> 368 Jane Green 0767905202 Tareq 0 to-read 3.48 1999 Mr. Maybe
author: Jane Green
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.48
book published: 1999
rating: 0
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]]> Jemima J 227941
With a fast-paced plot that never quits and a surprise ending no reader will see coming, Jemima J is the chronicle of one woman's quest to become the woman she's always wanted to be, learning along the way a host of lessons about attraction, addiction, the meaning of true love, and, ultimately, who she really is.]]> 373 Jane Green 0767905180 Tareq 0 to-read 3.69 1998 Jemima J
author: Jane Green
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.69
book published: 1998
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing]]> 33926 The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing maps the progress of Jane Rosenal as she sets out on a personal and spirited expedition through the perilous terrain of sex, love, and relationships as well as the treacherous waters of the workplace. With an unforgettable comic touch, Melissa Bank skillfully teases out issues of the heart; puts a new spin on the mating dance; and captures what it's like to be a young woman coming of age in America today.]]> 274 Melissa Bank 0143035479 Tareq 0 to-read 3.36 1998 The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing
author: Melissa Bank
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.36
book published: 1998
rating: 0
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date added: 2009/04/05
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]]> <![CDATA[Good in Bed (Cannie Shapiro, #1)]]> 14748
For twenty-eight years, things have been tripping along nicely for Cannie Shapiro. Sure, her mother has come charging out of the closet, and her father has long since dropped out of her world. But she loves her friends, her rat terrier, Nifkin, and her job as pop culture reporter for The Philadelphia Examiner. She's even made a tenuous peace with her plus-size body.

But the day she opens up a national women's magazine and sees the words "Loving a Larger Woman" above her ex-boyfriend's byline, Cannie is plunged into misery...and the most amazing year of her life. From Philadelphia to Hollywood and back home again, she charts a new course for herself: mourning her losses, facing her past, and figuring out who she is and who she can become.]]> 376 Jennifer Weiner 0743418174 Tareq 0 to-read 3.76 2002 Good in Bed (Cannie Shapiro, #1)
author: Jennifer Weiner
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2002
rating: 0
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]]> The Nanny Diaries (Nanny, #1) 228333 306 Emma McLaughlin 0312291639 Tareq 0 to-read 3.47 2002 The Nanny Diaries (Nanny, #1)
author: Emma McLaughlin
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.47
book published: 2002
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Confessions of a Shopaholic (Shopaholic, #1)]]> 9416
Her job writing at Successful Savings not only bores her to tears, it doesn't pay much at all. And lately Becky's been chased by dismal letters from the bank –letters with large red sums she can't bear to read–and they're getting ever harder to ignore.

She tries cutting back. But none of her efforts succeeds. Becky's only consolation is to buy herself something ... just a little something....

Finally a story arises that Becky actually cares about, and her front-page article catalyzes a chain of events that will transform her life–and the lives of those around her–forever.]]> 368 Sophie Kinsella 0440241413 Tareq 0 to-read 3.71 2000 Confessions of a Shopaholic (Shopaholic, #1)
author: Sophie Kinsella
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2000
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood]]> 137791 383 Rebecca Wells 006075995X Tareq 0 to-read 3.86 1996 Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
author: Rebecca Wells
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1996
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Devil Wears Prada (The Devil Wears Prada, #1)]]> 5139
Andrea Sachs, a small-town girl fresh out of college, lands the job “a million girls would die for.� Hired as the assistant to Miranda Priestly, the high-profile, fabulously successful editor of Runway magazine, Andrea finds herself in an office that shouts Prada! Armani! Versace! at every turn, a world populated by impossibly thin, heart-wrenchingly stylish women and beautiful men clad in fine-ribbed turtlenecks and tight leather pants that show off their lifelong dedication to the gym. With breathtaking ease, Miranda can turn each and every one of these hip sophisticates into a scared, whimpering child.

THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA gives a rich and hilarious new meaning to complaints about “The Boss from Hell.� Narrated in Andrea’s smart, refreshingly disarming voice, it traces a deep, dark, devilish view of life at the top only hinted at in gossip columns and over Cosmopolitans at the trendiest cocktail parties. From sending the latest, not-yet-in-stores Harry Potter to Miranda’s children in Paris by private jet, to locating an unnamed antique store where Miranda had at some point admired a vintage dresser, to serving lattes to Miranda at precisely the piping hot temperature she prefers, Andrea is sorely tested each and every day—and often late into the night with orders barked over the phone. She puts up with it all by keeping her eyes on the prize: a recommendation from Miranda that will get Andrea a top job at any magazine of her choosing. As things escalate from the merely unacceptable to the downright outrageous, however, Andrea begins to realize that the job a million girls would die for may just kill her. And even if she survives, she has to decide whether or not the job is worth the price of her soul.]]> 384 Lauren Weisberger 0307275558 Tareq 0 to-read 3.82 2003 The Devil Wears Prada (The Devil Wears Prada, #1)
author: Lauren Weisberger
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2003
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Bridget Jones’s Diary (Bridget Jones, #1)]]> 227443 a. lose 7 pounds
b. stop smoking
c. develop Inner Poise

"129 lbs. (how is it possible to put on 4 pounds in the middle of the night? Could flesh have somehow solidified becoming denser and heavier? Repulsive, horrifying notion), alcohol units 4 (excellent), cigarettes 21 (poor but will give up totally tomorrow), number of correct lottery numbers 2 (better, but nevertheless useless)..."

"Bridget Jones' Diary" is the devastatingly self-aware, laugh-out-loud daily chronicle of Bridget's permanent, doomed quest for self-improvement � a year in which she resolves to: reduce the circumference of each thigh by 1.5 inches, visit the gym three times a week not just to buy a sandwich, form a functional relationship with a responsible adult - and learn to program the VCR.

Over the course of the year, Bridget loses a total of 72 pounds but gains a total of 74. She remains, however, optimistic. Through it all, Bridget will have you helpless with laughter, and � like millions of readers the world round � you'll find yourself shouting, "Bridget Jones is me!"]]> 288 Helen Fielding 014028009X Tareq 0 to-read 3.81 1996 Bridget Jones’s Diary (Bridget Jones, #1)
author: Helen Fielding
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1996
rating: 0
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]]> Foundation (Foundation, #1) 29579 The first novel in Isaac Asimov's classic science-fiction masterpiece, the Foundation series

For twelve thousand years the Galactic Empire has ruled supreme. Now it is dying. But only Hari Seldon, creator of the revolutionary science of psychohistory, can see into the future--to a dark age of ignorance, barbarism, and warfare that will last thirty thousand years. To preserve knowledge and save humankind, Seldon gathers the best minds in the Empire--both scientists and scholars--and brings them to a bleak planet at the edge of the galaxy to serve as a beacon of hope for future generations. He calls his sanctuary the Foundation.]]> 244 Isaac Asimov 0553803719 Tareq 0 to-read 4.18 1951 Foundation (Foundation, #1)
author: Isaac Asimov
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1951
rating: 0
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]]> Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1) 22328 Alternate cover for ISBN: 9780441569595

Case was the sharpest data thief in the Matrix, until an ex-employer crippled his nervous system. Now a new employer has recruited him for a last-chance run against an unthinkably powerful artificial intelligence. With a mirror-eyed girl street-samurai riding shotgun, he's ready for the silicon-quick, bleakly prophetic adventure that upped the ante on an entire genre of fiction.]]> 271 William Gibson Tareq 0 to-read 3.87 1984 Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1)
author: William Gibson
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1984
rating: 0
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]]> Snow Crash 830 Snow Crash is a mind-altering romp through a future America so bizarre, so outrageous� you'll recognize it immediately.]]> 438 Neal Stephenson 0553380958 Tareq 0 to-read 4.02 1992 Snow Crash
author: Neal Stephenson
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1992
rating: 0
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date added: 2009/04/05
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]]> Stranger in a Strange Land 350 NAME: Valentine Michael Smith
ANCESTRY: Human
ORIGIN: Mars

Valentine Michael Smith is a human being raised on Mars, newly returned to Earth. Among his people for the first time, he struggles to understand the social mores and prejudices of human nature that are so alien to him, while teaching them his own fundamental beliefs in grokking, watersharing, and love.]]> 525 Robert A. Heinlein Tareq 4 3.93 1961 Stranger in a Strange Land
author: Robert A. Heinlein
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1961
rating: 4
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]]> Dune (Dune, #1) 234225 Dune is the story of the boy Paul Atreides, heir to a noble family tasked with ruling an inhospitable world where the only thing of value is the "spice" melange, a drug capable of extending life and enhancing consciousness. Coveted across the known universe, melange is a prize worth killing for...

When House Atreides is betrayed, the destruction of Paul's family will set the boy on a journey toward a destiny greater than he could ever have imagined. And as he evolves into the mysterious man known as Muad'Dib, he will bring to fruition humankind's most ancient and unattainable dream.

A stunning blend of adventure and mysticism, environmentalism and politics, Dune won the first Nebula Award, shared the Hugo Award, and formed the basis of what is undoubtedly the grandest epic in science fiction.]]> 604 Frank Herbert 0340839937 Tareq 0 to-read 4.21 1965 Dune (Dune, #1)
author: Frank Herbert
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1965
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #1)]]> 11
Together this dynamic pair begin a journey through space aided by quotes from The Hitchhiker's Guide ("A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have") and a galaxy-full of fellow travelers: Zaphod Beeblebrox--the two-headed, three-armed ex-hippie and totally out-to-lunch president of the galaxy; Trillian, Zaphod's girlfriend (formally Tricia McMillan), whom Arthur tried to pick up at a cocktail party once upon a time zone; Marvin, a paranoid, brilliant, and chronically depressed robot; Veet Voojagig, a former graduate student who is obsessed with the disappearance of all the ballpoint pens he bought over the years.

Where are these pens? Why are we born? Why do we die? Why do we spend so much time between wearing digital watches? For all the answers stick your thumb to the stars. And don't forget to bring a towel!]]> 216 Douglas Adams Tareq 0 to-read 4.21 1979 The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #1)
author: Douglas Adams
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1979
rating: 0
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]]> Fahrenheit 451 4381 158 Ray Bradbury 0307347974 Tareq 4 3.96 1953 Fahrenheit 451
author: Ray Bradbury
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1953
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Ender’s Game (Ender's Saga, #1)]]> 375802
But Ender is not the only result of the experiment. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway almost as long. Ender's two older siblings, Peter and Valentine, are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. While Peter was too uncontrollably violent, Valentine very nearly lacks the capability for violence altogether. Neither was found suitable for the military's purpose. But they are driven by their jealousy of Ender, and by their inbred drive for power. Peter seeks to control the political process, to become a ruler. Valentine's abilities turn more toward the subtle control of the beliefs of commoner and elite alike, through powerfully convincing essays. Hiding their youth and identities behind the anonymity of the computer networks, these two begin working together to shape the destiny of Earth-an Earth that has no future at all if their brother Ender fails.]]> 324 Orson Scott Card 0812550706 Tareq 0 to-read 4.31 1985 Ender’s Game (Ender's Saga, #1)
author: Orson Scott Card
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.31
book published: 1985
rating: 0
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]]> Brave New World 5129 Brave New World is a searching vision of an unequal, technologically-advanced future where humans are genetically bred, socially indoctrinated, and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively uphold an authoritarian ruling order–all at the cost of our freedom, full humanity, and perhaps also our souls. “A genius [who] who spent his life decrying the onward march of the Machine� (The New Yorker), Huxley was a man of incomparable talents: equally an artist, a spiritual seeker, and one of history’s keenest observers of human nature and civilization. Brave New World, his masterpiece, has enthralled and terrified millions of readers, and retains its urgent relevance to this day as both a warning to be heeded as we head into tomorrow and as thought-provoking, satisfying work of literature. Written in the shadow of the rise of fascism during the 1930s, Brave New Worldd likewise speaks to a 21st-century world dominated by mass-entertainment, technology, medicine and pharmaceuticals, the arts of persuasion, and the hidden influence of elites.

"Aldous Huxley is the greatest 20th century writer in English." —Chicago Tribune]]> 268 Aldous Huxley 0060929871 Tareq 4 3.99 1932 Brave New World
author: Aldous Huxley
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1932
rating: 4
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]]> 1984 5470 328 George Orwell Tareq 5 4.15 1949 1984
author: George Orwell
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1949
rating: 5
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]]> Like Water for Chocolate 6952
The number one bestseller in Mexico and America for almost two years, and subsequently a bestseller around the world, Like Water For Chocolate is a romantic, poignant tale, touched with moments of magic, graphic earthiness, bittersweet wit - and recipes.

A sumptuous feast of a novel, it relates the bizarre history of the all-female De La Garza family. Tita, the youngest daughter of the house, has been forbidden to marry, condemned by Mexican tradition to look after her mother until she dies. But Tita falls in love with Pedro, and he is seduced by the magical food she cooks. In desperation, Pedro marries her sister Rosaura so that he can stay close to her, so that Tita and Pedro are forced to circle each other in unconsummated passion. Only a freakish chain of tragedies, bad luck and fate finally reunite them against all the odds.]]> 222 Laura Esquivel Tareq 0 to-read 3.96 1989 Like Water for Chocolate
author: Laura Esquivel
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1989
rating: 0
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]]> Outlander (Outlander, #1) 10964
Hurled back in time by forces she cannot understand, Claire is catapulted into the intrigues of lairds and spies that may threaten her life, and shatter her heart. For here James Fraser, a gallant young Scots warrior, shows her a love so absolute that Claire becomes a woman torn between fidelity and desire—and between two vastly different men in two irreconcilable lives.]]> 850 Diana Gabaldon 0440242940 Tareq 0 to-read 4.25 1991 Outlander (Outlander, #1)
author: Diana Gabaldon
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1991
rating: 0
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]]> The Princess Bride 21787
As a boy, William Goldman claims, he loved to hear his father read the S. Morgenstern classic, The Princess Bride. But as a grown-up he discovered that the boring parts were left out of good old Dad's recitation, and only the "good parts" reached his ears.

Now Goldman does Dad one better. He's reconstructed the "Good Parts Version" to delight wise kids and wide-eyed grownups everywhere.

What's it about? Fencing. Fighting. True Love. Strong Hate. Harsh Revenge. A Few Giants. Lots of Bad Men. Lots of Good Men. Five or Six Beautiful Women. Beasties Monstrous and Gentle. Some Swell Escapes and Captures. Death, Lies, Truth, Miracles, and a Little Sex.

In short, it's about everything.]]> 429 William Goldman 0345418263 Tareq 0 to-read 4.27 1973 The Princess Bride
author: William Goldman
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1973
rating: 0
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]]> Gone with the Wind 18405 1037 Margaret Mitchell 0446365386 Tareq 4 4.30 1936 Gone with the Wind
author: Margaret Mitchell
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.30
book published: 1936
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Notebook (The Notebook, #1)]]> 15931
Set amid the austere beauty of coastal North Carolina in 1946, The Notebook begins with the story of Noah Calhoun, a rural Southerner returned home from World War II. Noah, thirty-one, is restoring a plantation home to its former glory, and he is haunted by images of the beautiful girl he met fourteen years earlier, a girl he loved like no other. Unable to find her, yet unwilling to forget the summer they spent together, Noah is content to live with only memories...until she unexpectedly returns to his town to see him once again.

Allie Nelson, twenty-nine, is now engaged to another man, but realizes that the original passion she felt for Noah has not dimmed with the passage of time. Still, the obstacles that once ended their previous relationship remain, and the gulf between their worlds is too vast to ignore. With her impending marriage only weeks away, Allie is forced to confront her hopes and dreams for the future, a future that only she can shape.

Like a puzzle within a puzzle, the story of Noah and Allie is just the beginning. As it unfolds, their tale miraculously becomes something different, with much higher stakes. The result is a deeply moving portrait of love itself, the tender moments and the fundamental changes that affect us all. Shining with a beauty that is rarely found in current literature, The Notebook establishes Nicholas Sparks as a classic storyteller with a unique insight into the only emotion that really matters.

"I am nothing special, of this I am sure. I am a common man with common thoughts and I've led a common life. There are no monuments dedicated to me and my name will soon be forgotten, but I've loved another with all my heart and soul, and to me, this has always been enough."

And so begins one of the most poignant and compelling love stories you will ever read...The Notebook]]> 214 Nicholas Sparks 0553816713 Tareq 0 to-read 4.07 1996 The Notebook (The Notebook, #1)
author: Nicholas Sparks
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1996
rating: 0
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]]> Sense and Sensibility 14935 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780141439662

'The more I know of the world, the more am I convinced that I shall never see a man whom I can really love. I require so much!'

Marianne Dashwood wears her heart on her sleeve, and when she falls in love with the dashing but unsuitable John Willoughby she ignores her sister Elinor's warning that her impulsive behaviour leaves her open to gossip and innuendo. Meanwhile Elinor, always sensitive to social convention, is struggling to conceal her own romantic disappointment, even from those closest to her. Through their parallel experience of love—and its threatened loss—the sisters learn that sense must mix with sensibility if they are to find personal happiness in a society where status and money govern the rules of love.

This edition includes explanatory notes, textual variants between the first and second editions, and Tony Tanner's introduction to the original Penguin Classic edition.]]> 409 Jane Austen 0141439661 Tareq 0 to-read 4.10 1811 Sense and Sensibility
author: Jane Austen
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1811
rating: 0
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]]> Jane Eyre 10210 Alternate editions can be found here and here.

A gothic masterpiece of tempestuous passions and dark secrets, Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre is edited with an introduction and notes by Stevie Davis in Penguin Classics.

Charlotte Brontë tells the story of orphaned Jane Eyre, who grows up in the home of her heartless aunt, enduring loneliness and cruelty. This troubled childhood strengthens Jane's natural independence and spirit - which prove necessary when she finds employment as a governess to the young ward of Byronic, brooding Mr Rochester. As her feelings for Rochester develop, Jane gradually uncovers Thornfield Hall's terrible secret, forcing her to make a choice. Should she stay with Rochester and live with the consequences, or follow her convictions - even if it means leaving the man she loves? A novel of intense power and intrigue, Jane Eyre dazzled readers with its passionate depiction of a woman's search for equality and freedom.]]> 532 Charlotte Brontë 0142437204 Tareq 3 4.14 1847 Jane Eyre
author: Charlotte Brontë
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1847
rating: 3
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]]> The Time Traveler's Wife 14050 537 Audrey Niffenegger 0965818675 Tareq 0 to-read 3.90 2003 The Time Traveler's Wife
author: Audrey Niffenegger
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2003
rating: 0
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]]> Pride and Prejudice 1885 Pride and Prejudice has remained one of the most popular novels in the English language. Jane Austen called this brilliant work "her own darling child" and its vivacious heroine, Elizabeth Bennet, "as delightful a creature as ever appeared in print." The romantic clash between the opinionated Elizabeth and her proud beau, Mr. Darcy, is a splendid performance of civilized sparring. And Jane Austen's radiant wit sparkles as her characters dance a delicate quadrille of flirtation and intrigue, making this book the most superb comedy of manners of Regency England.

Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780679783268]]> 279 Jane Austen 1441341706 Tareq 0 to-read 4.28 1813 Pride and Prejudice
author: Jane Austen
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.28
book published: 1813
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Twilight (The Twilight Saga, #1)]]> 41865
First, Edward was a vampire.

Second, there was a part of him - and I didn't know how dominant that part might be - that thirsted for my blood.

And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him.

Deeply seductive and extraordinarily suspenseful, Twilight is a love story with bite.]]> 498 Stephenie Meyer 0316015849 Tareq 3 3.66 2005 Twilight (The Twilight Saga, #1)
author: Stephenie Meyer
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2005
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Eragon (The Inheritance Cycle #1)]]> 113436 An alternate cover edition for ISBN 9780375826696 can be found here.

One boy...
One dragon...
A world of adventure.

When Eragon finds a polished blue stone in the forest, he thinks it is the lucky discovery of a poor farm boy; perhaps it will buy his family meat for the winter. But when the stone brings a dragon hatchling, Eragon soon realizes he has stumbled upon a legacy nearly as old as the Empire itself.

Overnight his simple life is shattered, and he is thrust into a perilous new world of destiny, magic, and power. With only an ancient sword and the advice of an old storyteller for guidance, Eragon and the fledgling dragon must navigate the dangerous terrain and dark enemies of an Empire ruled by a king whose evil knows no bounds.

Can Eragon take up the mantle of the legendary Dragon Riders? The fate of the Empire may rest in his hands.]]> 503 Christopher Paolini 0375826696 Tareq 3 3.96 2002 Eragon (The Inheritance Cycle #1)
author: Christopher Paolini
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2002
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[The Golden Compass (His Dark Materials, #1)]]> 119322
Can one small girl make a difference in such great and terrible endeavors? This is Lyra: a savage, a schemer, a liar, and as fierce and true a champion as Roger or Asriel could want--but what Lyra doesn't know is that to help one of them will be to betray the other.]]> 399 Philip Pullman 0679879242 Tareq 3 4.02 1995 The Golden Compass (His Dark Materials, #1)
author: Philip Pullman
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1995
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[The Fellowship of the Ring (The Lord of the Rings, #1)]]> 34
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkeness bind them

In ancient times the Rings of Power were crafted by the Elven-smiths, and Sauron, The Dark Lord, forged the One Ring, filling it with his own power so that he could rule all others. But the One Ring was taken from him, and though he sought it throughout Middle-earth, it remained lost to him. After many ages it fell into the hands of Bilbo Baggins, as told in The Hobbit.

In a sleepy village in the Shire, young Frodo Baggins finds himself faced with an immense task, as his elderly cousin Bilbo entrusts the Ring to his care. Frodo must leave his home and make a perilous journey across Middle-earth to the Cracks of Doom, there to destroy the Ring and foil the Dark Lord in his evil purpose.
--back cover]]> 398 J.R.R. Tolkien 0618346252 Tareq 4 4.36 1954 The Fellowship of the Ring (The Lord of the Rings, #1)
author: J.R.R. Tolkien
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.36
book published: 1954
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Hobbit, or There and Back Again]]> 5907 Written for J.R.R. Tolkien’s own children, The Hobbit met with instant critical acclaim when it was first published in 1937. Now recognized as a timeless classic, this introduction to the hobbit Bilbo Baggins, the wizard Gandalf, Gollum, and the spectacular world of Middle-earth recounts of the adventures of a reluctant hero, a powerful and dangerous ring, and the cruel dragon Smaug the Magnificent. The text in this 372-page paperback edition is based on that first published in Great Britain by Collins Modern Classics (1998), and includes a note on the text by Douglas A. Anderson (2001).]]> 366 J.R.R. Tolkien Tareq 3 4.29 1937 The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
author: J.R.R. Tolkien
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1937
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Harry Potter, #1)]]> 3 309 J.K. Rowling 0439554934 Tareq 3 4.47 1997 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Harry Potter, #1)
author: J.K. Rowling
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.47
book published: 1997
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America]]> 1869
Millions of Americans work for poverty-level wages, and one day Barbara Ehrenreich decided to join them. She was inspired in part by the rhetoric surrounding welfare reform, which promised that any job equals a better life. But how can anyone survive, let alone prosper, on $6 to $7 an hour? To find out, Ehrenreich moved from Florida to Maine to Minnesota, taking the cheapest lodgings available and accepting work as a waitress, hotel maid, house cleaner, nursing-home aide, and Wal-Mart salesperson. She soon discovered that even the "lowliest" occupations require exhausting mental and physical efforts. And one job is not enough; you need at least two if you intend to live indoors.

Nickel and Dimed reveals low-wage America in all its tenacity, anxiety, and surprising generosity -- a land of Big Boxes, fast food, and a thousand desperate strategies for survival. Instantly acclaimed for its insight, humor, and passion, this book is changing the way America perceives its working poor.]]> 240 Barbara Ehrenreich 0805063897 Tareq 0 to-read 3.65 2001 Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America
author: Barbara Ehrenreich
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2001
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal]]> 1097
Schlosser's myth-shattering survey stretches from California's subdivisions where the business was born to the industrial corridor along the New Jersey Turnpike where many fast food's flavors are concocted. Along the way, he unearths a trove of fascinating, unsettling truths -- from the unholy alliance between fast food and Hollywood to the seismic changes the industry has wrought in food production, popular culture, and even real estate.
(back cover)]]> 383 Eric Schlosser 0060838582 Tareq 0 to-read 3.75 2001 Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal
author: Eric Schlosser
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2001
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster]]> 1898
Into Thin Air is the definitive account of the deadliest season in the history of Everest by the acclaimed journalist and author of the bestseller Into the Wild. On assignment for Outside Magazine to report on the growing commercialization of the mountain, Krakauer, an accomplished climber, went to the Himalayas as a client of Rob Hall, the most respected high-altitude guide in the world. A rangy, thirty-five-year-old New Zealander, Hall had summited Everest four times between 1990 and 1995 and had led thirty-nine climbers to the top. Ascending the mountain in close proximity to Hall's team was a guided expedition led by Scott Fischer, a forty-year-old American with legendary strength and drive who had climbed the peak without supplemental oxygen in 1994. But neither Hall nor Fischer survived the rogue storm that struck in May 1996.

Krakauer examines what it is about Everest that has compelled so many people -- including himself -- to throw caution to the wind, ignore the concerns of loved ones, and willingly subject themselves to such risk, hardship, and expense. Written with emotional clarity and supported by his unimpeachable reporting, Krakauer's eyewitness account of what happened on the roof of the world is a singular achievement.]]> 368 Jon Krakauer Tareq 0 to-read 4.24 1997 Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster
author: Jon Krakauer
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1997
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference]]> 2612 The tipping point is that magic moment when an idea, trend, or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads like wildfire. Just as a single sick person can start an epidemic of the flu, so too can a small but precisely targeted push cause a fashion trend, the popularity of a new product, or a drop in the crime rate. This widely acclaimed bestseller, in which Malcolm Gladwell explores and brilliantly illuminates the tipping point phenomenon, is already changing the way people throughout the world think about selling products and disseminating ideas.]]> 301 Malcolm Gladwell 0316346624 Tareq 0 to-read 4.01 2002 The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
author: Malcolm Gladwell
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2002
rating: 0
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]]> In Cold Blood 168642
As Truman Capote reconstructs the murder and the investigation that led to the capture, trial, and execution of the killers, he generates both mesmerizing suspense and astonishing empathy. In Cold Blood is a work that transcends its moment, yielding poignant insights into the nature of American violence.]]> 343 Truman Capote 0679745580 Tareq 0 to-read 4.08 1966 In Cold Blood
author: Truman Capote
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1966
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything]]> 1202
These may not sound like typical questions for an economist to ask. But Steven D. Levitt is not a typical economist. He is a much heralded scholar who studies the stuff and riddles of everyday life -- from cheating and crime to sports and child rearing -- and whose conclusions regularly turn the conventional wisdom on its head. He usually begins with a mountain of data and a simple, unasked question. Some of these questions concern life-and-death issues; others have an admittedly freakish quality. Thus the new field of study contained in this book: freakonomics.

Through forceful storytelling and wry insight, Levitt and co-author Stephen J. Dubner show that economics is, at root, the study of incentives -- how people get what they want, or need, especially when other people want or need the same thing. In Freakonomics, they set out to explore the hidden side of ... well, everything. The inner workings of a crack gang. The truth about real-estate agents. The myths of campaign finance. The telltale marks of a cheating schoolteacher. The secrets of the Ku Klux Klan.

What unites all these stories is a belief that the modern world, despite a surfeit of obfuscation, complication, and downright deceit, is not impenetrable, is not unknowable, and -- if the right questions are asked -- is even more intriguing than we think. All it takes is a new way of looking. Steven Levitt, through devilishly clever and clear-eyed thinking, shows how to see through all the clutter.

Freakonomics establishes this unconventional premise: If morality represents how we would like the world to work, then economics represents how it actually does work. It is true that readers of this book will be armed with enough riddles and stories to last a thousand cocktail parties. But Freakonomics can provide more than that. It will literally redefine the way we view the modern world.
(front flap)]]> 268 Steven D. Levitt 0061234001 Tareq 0 to-read 4.01 2005 Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
author: Steven D. Levitt
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2005
rating: 0
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]]> Into the Wild 1845 Librarian's Note: An alternate cover edition can be found here

In April, 1992, a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. His name was Christopher Johnson McCandless. He had given $25,000 in savings to charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet, and invented a new life for himself. Four months later, a party of moose hunters found his decomposed body. How McCandless came to die is the unforgettable story of Into the Wild.

Immediately after graduating from college in 1991, McCandless had roamed through the West and Southwest on a vision quest like those made by his heroes Jack London and John Muir. In the Mojave Desert he abandoned his car, stripped it of its license plates, and burned all of his cash. He would give himself a new name, Alexander Supertramp, and, unencumbered by money and belongings, he would be free to wallow in the raw, unfiltered experiences that nature presented. Craving a blank spot on the map, McCandless simply threw away the maps. Leaving behind his desperate parents and sister, he vanished into the wild.]]> 207 Jon Krakauer 0385486804 Tareq 0 to-read 4.01 1996 Into the Wild
author: Jon Krakauer
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1996
rating: 0
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]]> The Diary of a Young Girl 48855
In 1942, with the Nazis occupying Holland, a thirteen-year-old Jewish girl and her family fled their home in Amsterdam and went into hiding. For the next two years, until their whereabouts were betrayed to the Gestapo, the Franks and another family lived cloistered in the “Secret Annexe� of an old office building. Cut off from the outside world, they faced hunger, boredom, the constant cruelties of living in confined quarters, and the ever-present threat of discovery and death. In her diary Anne Frank recorded vivid impressions of her experiences during this period. By turns thoughtful, moving, and surprisingly humorous, her account offers a fascinating commentary on human courage and frailty and a compelling self-portrait of a sensitive and spirited young woman whose promise was tragically cut short.
--back cover]]> 283 Anne Frank Tareq 0 to-read 4.19 1947 The Diary of a Young Girl
author: Anne Frank
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1947
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Hunt for Red October (Jack Ryan, #3)]]> 19691 Somewhere under the Atlantic, a Soviet sub commander has just made a fateful decision. The Red October is heading west. The Americans want her. The Russians want her back. And the most incredible chase in history is on...

]]> 432 Tom Clancy 0425172902 Tareq 0 to-read 4.11 1984 The Hunt for Red October (Jack Ryan, #3)
author: Tom Clancy
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1984
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Bourne Identity (Jason Bourne, #1)]]> 7869 Alternate cover for this ISBN can be found here

Who is Jason Bourne? Is he an assassin, a terrorist, a thief? Why has he got four million dollars in a Swiss bank account? Why has someone tried to murder him?...

Jason Bourne does not know the answer to any of these questions. Suffering from amnesia, he does not even know that he is Jason Bourne. What manner of man is he? What are his secrets? Who has he killed?]]> 566 Robert Ludlum 0752864327 Tareq 0 to-read 4.06 1980 The Bourne Identity (Jason Bourne, #1)
author: Robert Ludlum
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1980
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Silence of the Lambs (Hannibal Lecter, #2)]]> 23807
Dr. Lecter is a former psychiatrist with a grisly history, unusual tastes, and an intense curiosity about the darker corners of the mind. His intimate understanding of the killer and of Clarice herself form the core of "The Silence of the Lambs"—an ingenious, masterfully written book and an unforgettable classic of suspense fiction.]]> 421 Thomas Harris Tareq 3 4.25 1988 The Silence of the Lambs (Hannibal Lecter, #2)
author: Thomas Harris
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1988
rating: 3
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]]> Odd Thomas (Odd Thomas, #1) 14995
Something evil has come to the desert town that Odd and Stormy call home. It comes in the form of a mysterious man with a macabre appetite, a filing cabinet full of information on the world's worst killers, and strange, hyena-like shadows following him wherever he goes. Odd is worried. He knows things, sees things - about the living, the dead, and the soon-to-be dead. Things that he has to act on. Now he's terrified for Stormy, himself and Pico Mundo. Because he knows that on Wednesday August 15, a savage, blood-soaked whirlwind of violence and murder will devastate the town...

Today is August 14.
And Odd is far from sure he can stop the coming storm...]]> 446 Dean Koontz 0553384287 Tareq 0 to-read 3.98 2003 Odd Thomas (Odd Thomas, #1)
author: Dean Koontz
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2003
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Jurassic Park (Parque Jurásico, #1)]]> 452196 466 Michael Crichton 9871138806 Tareq 3 3.70 1990 Jurassic Park (Parque Jurásico, #1)
author: Michael Crichton
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1990
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[A Time to Kill (Jake Brigance, #1)]]> 32542 This is an alternate cover edition for ISBN 9780385338608

Before The Firm and The Pelican Brief made him a superstar, John Grisham wrote this riveting story of retribution and justice. In this searing courtroom drama, best-selling author John Grisham probes the savage depths of racial violence, as he delivers a compelling tale of uncertain justice in a small southern town, Clanton, Mississippi.

The life of a ten-year-old girl is shattered by two drunken and remorseless young men. The mostly white town reacts with shock and horror at the inhuman crime. That is, until her black father acquires an assault rifle and takes matters into his hands.

For ten days, as burning crosses and the crack of sniper fire spread through the streets of Clanton, the nation sits spellbound as young defense attorney Jake Brigance struggles to save his client's life, and then his own.]]> 738 John Grisham Tareq 0 to-read 4.11 1989 A Time to Kill (Jake Brigance, #1)
author: John Grisham
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1989
rating: 0
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]]> The Shining (The Shining, #1) 11588 497 Stephen King 0450040186 Tareq 4 4.28 1977 The Shining (The Shining, #1)
author: Stephen King
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.28
book published: 1977
rating: 4
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]]> The Kite Runner 77203 371 Khaled Hosseini 159463193X Tareq 0 to-read 4.34 2003 The Kite Runner
author: Khaled Hosseini
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2003
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The da Vinci Code (Robert Langdon, #2)]]> 968 The da Vinci Code, The da Vinci Code, The da Vinci Code, and The da Vinci Code

While in Paris on business, Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon receives an urgent late-night phone call: the elderly curator of the Louvre has been murdered inside the museum. Near the body, police have found a baffling cipher. While working to solve the enigmatic riddle, Langdon is stunned to discover it leads to a trail of clues hidden in the works of Da Vinci -- clues visible for all to see -- yet ingeniously disguised by the painter.

Langdon joins forces with a gifted French cryptologist, Sophie Neveu, and learns the late curator was involved in the Priory of Sion -- an actual secret society whose members included Sir Isaac Newton, Botticelli, Victor Hugo, and Da Vinci, among others.

In a breathless race through Paris, London, and beyond, Langdon and Neveu match wits with a faceless powerbroker who seems to anticipate their every move. Unless Langdon and Neveu can decipher the labyrinthine puzzle in time, the Priory's ancient secret -- and an explosive historical truth -- will be lost forever.

The Da Vinci Code heralds the arrival of a new breed of lightning-paced, intelligent thriller utterly unpredictable right up to its stunning conclusion.]]> 489 Dan Brown Tareq 3 3.92 2003 The da Vinci Code (Robert Langdon, #2)
author: Dan Brown
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2003
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Under the Tuscan Sun: At Home in Italy]]> 480479
Frances Mayes entered a wondrous new world when she began restoring an abandoned villa in the spectacular Tuscan countryside. There were unexpected treasures at every turn: faded frescos beneath the whitewash in her dining room, a vineyard under wildly overgrown brambles in the garden, and, in the nearby hill towns, vibrant markets and delightful people. In Under the Tuscan Sun, she brings the lyrical voice of a poet, the eye of a seasoned traveler, and the discerning palate of a cook and food writer to invite readers to explore the pleasures of Italian life and to feast at her table.]]> 304 Frances Mayes 0767900383 Tareq 0 to-read 3.77 1996 Under the Tuscan Sun: At Home in Italy
author: Frances Mayes
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1996
rating: 0
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]]> Lolita 7604 Librarian's note: Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780141182537.

Humbert Humbert - scholar, aesthete and romantic - has fallen completely and utterly in love with Dolores Haze, his landlady's gum-snapping, silky skinned twelve-year-old daughter. Reluctantly agreeing to marry Mrs Haze just to be close to Lolita, Humbert suffers greatly in the pursuit of romance; but when Lo herself starts looking for attention elsewhere, he will carry her off on a desperate cross-country misadventure, all in the name of Love. Hilarious, flamboyant, heart-breaking and full of ingenious word play, Lolita is an immaculate, unforgettable masterpiece of obsession, delusion and lust.]]> 368 Vladimir Nabokov 0679723161 Tareq 0 to-read 3.87 1955 Lolita
author: Vladimir Nabokov
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1955
rating: 0
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]]> The Memory Keeper's Daughter 10441 401 Kim Edwards 0143037145 Tareq 0 to-read 3.70 2005 The Memory Keeper's Daughter
author: Kim Edwards
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2005
rating: 0
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]]> Middlesex 2187 Middlesex tells the breathtaking story of Calliope Stephanides, and three generations of the Greek-American Stephanides family, who travel from a tiny village overlooking Mount Olympus in Asia Minor to Prohibition-era Detroit, witnessing its glory days as the Motor City and the race riots of 1967 before moving out to the tree-lined streets of suburban Grosse Pointe, Michigan. To understand why Calliope is not like other girls, she has to uncover a guilty family secret, and the astonishing genetic history that turns Callie into Cal, one of the most audacious and wondrous narrators in contemporary fiction. Lyrical and thrilling, Middlesex is an exhilarating reinvention of the American epic.]]> 529 Jeffrey Eugenides 0312422156 Tareq 0 to-read 4.03 2002 Middlesex
author: Jeffrey Eugenides
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2002
rating: 0
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]]> The Poisonwood Bible 7244 The Poisonwood Bible is a story told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce, evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them everything they believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it -- from garden seeds to Scripture -- is calamitously transformed on African soil. What follows is a suspenseful epic of one family's tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa.]]> 546 Barbara Kingsolver 0060786507 Tareq 0 to-read 4.10 1998 The Poisonwood Bible
author: Barbara Kingsolver
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1998
rating: 0
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]]> Eat, Pray, Love 19501
Around the time Elizabeth Gilbert turned thirty, she went through an early-onslaught midlife crisis. She had everything an educated, ambitious American woman was supposed to want—a husband, a house, a successful career. But instead of feeling happy and fulfilled, she was consumed with panic, grief, and confusion. She went through a divorce, a crushing depression, another failed love, and the eradication of everything she ever thought she was supposed to be.

To recover from all this, Gilbert took a radical step. In order to give herself the time and space to find out who she really was and what she really wanted, she got rid of her belongings, quit her job, and undertook a yearlong journey around the world—all alone. Eat, Pray, Love is the absorbing chronicle of that year. Her aim was to visit three places where she could examine one aspect of her own nature set against the backdrop of a culture that has traditionally done that one thing very well. In Rome, she studied the art of pleasure, learning to speak Italian and gaining the twenty-three happiest pounds of her life. India was for the art of devotion, and with the help of a native guru and a surprisingly wise cowboy from Texas, she embarked on four uninterrupted months of spiritual exploration. In Bali, she studied the art of balance between worldly enjoyment and divine transcendence. She became the pupil of an elderly medicine man and also fell in love the best way—unexpectedly.

An intensely articulate and moving memoir of self-discovery, Eat, Pray, Love is about what can happen when you claim responsibility for your own contentment and stop trying to live in imitation of society’s ideals. It is certain to touch anyone who has ever woken up to the unrelenting need for change.]]> 368 Elizabeth Gilbert 0143038419 Tareq 0 to-read 3.64 2006 Eat, Pray, Love
author: Elizabeth Gilbert
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2006
rating: 0
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]]> The Secret Life of Bees 37435 The Secret Life of Bees tells the story of Lily Owens, whose life has been shaped around the blurred memory of the afternoon her mother was killed. When Lily's fierce-hearted black "stand-in mother," Rosaleen, insults three of the deepest racists in town, Lily decides to spring them both free. They escape to Tiburon, South Carolina--a town that holds the secret to her mother's past. Taken in by an eccentric trio of black beekeeping sisters, Lily is introduced to their mesmerizing world of bees and honey, and the Black Madonna. This is a remarkable novel about divine female power, a story women will share and pass on to their daughters for years to come.]]> 302 Sue Monk Kidd 0142001740 Tareq 0 to-read 4.10 2001 The Secret Life of Bees
author: Sue Monk Kidd
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2001
rating: 0
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]]> Memoirs of a Geisha 930
In "Memoirs of a Geisha," we enter a world where appearances are paramount; where a girl's virginity is auctioned to the highest bidder; where women are trained to beguile the most powerful men; and where love is scorned as illusion. It is a unique and triumphant work of fiction - at once romantic, erotic, suspenseful - and completely unforgettable.]]> 434 Arthur Golden 0739326228 Tareq 0 to-read 4.07 1997 Memoirs of a Geisha
author: Arthur Golden
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1997
rating: 0
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]]> Moby-Dick or, The Whale 153747 "It is the horrible texture of a fabric that should be woven of ships' cables and hawsers. A Polar wind blows through it, and birds of prey hover over it."

So Melville wrote of his masterpiece, one of the greatest works of imagination in literary history. In part, Moby-Dick is the story of an eerily compelling madman pursuing an unholy war against a creature as vast and dangerous and unknowable as the sea itself. But more than just a novel of adventure, more than an encyclopaedia of whaling lore and legend, the book can be seen as part of its author's lifelong meditation on America. Written with wonderfully redemptive humour, Moby-Dick is also a profound inquiry into character, faith, and the nature of perception.

This edition of Moby-Dick, which reproduces the definitive text of the novel, includes invaluable explanatory notes, along with maps, illustrations, and a glossary of nautical terms.]]> 720 Herman Melville 0142437247 Tareq 4 3.53 1851 Moby-Dick or, The Whale
author: Herman Melville
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.53
book published: 1851
rating: 4
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]]> Les Misérables 24280 1463 Victor Hugo 0451525264 Tareq 5 4.19 1862 Les Misérables
author: Victor Hugo
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1862
rating: 5
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]]> The Odyssey 1381 Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists and turns
driven time and again off course, once he had plundered
the hallowed heights of Troy.

So begins Robert Fagles' magnificent translation of the Odyssey.

If the Iliad is the world's greatest war epic, then the Odyssey is literature's grandest evocation of everyman's journey though life. Odysseus' reliance on his wit and wiliness for survival in his encounters with divine and natural forces, during his ten-year voyage home to Ithaca after the Trojan War, is at once a timeless human story and an individual test of moral endurance.

In the myths and legends that are retold here, Fagles has captured the energy and poetry of Homer's original in a bold, contemporary idiom, and given us an Odyssey to read aloud, to savor, and to treasure for its sheer lyrical mastery.

Renowned classicist Bernard Knox's superb Introduction and textual commentary provide new insights and background information for the general reader and scholar alike, intensifying the strength of Fagles' translation.

This is an Odyssey to delight both the classicist and the public at large, and to captivate a new generation of Homer's students.

--

Robert Fagles, winner of the PEN/Ralph Manheim Medal for Translation and a 1996 Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, presents us with Homer's best-loved and most accessible poem in a stunning new modern-verse translation.]]> 541 Homer 0143039954 Tareq 4 3.79 -700 The Odyssey
author: Homer
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.79
book published: -700
rating: 4
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]]> Frankenstein 18490 This is an alternate cover edition for ISBN 9780141439471

'Now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart ...'

Obsessed with creating life itself, Victor Frankenstein plunders graveyards for the material to fashion a new being, which he shocks into life with electricity. But his botched creature, rejected by Frankenstein and denied human companionship, sets out to destroy his maker and all that he holds dear. Mary Shelley's chilling Gothic tale was conceived when she was only eighteen, living with her lover Percy Shelley near Byron's villa on Lake Geneva. It would become the world's most famous work of horror fiction, and remains a devastating exploration of the limits of human creativity.

Based on the third edition of 1831, this volume contains all the revisions Mary Shelley made to her story, as well as her 1831 introduction and Percy Bysshe Shelley's preface to the first edition. This revised edition includes as appendices a select collation of the texts of 1818 and 1831 together with 'A Fragment' by Lord Byron and Dr John Polidori's 'The Vampyre: A Tale'.]]> 288 Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley Tareq 2 3.77 1818 Frankenstein
author: Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1818
rating: 2
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]]> A Tale of Two Cities 1953 A Tale of Two Cities is Charles Dickens’s great historical novel, set against the violent upheaval of the French Revolution. The most famous and perhaps the most popular of his works, it compresses an event of immense complexity to the scale of a family history, with a cast of characters that includes a bloodthirsty ogress and an antihero as believably flawed as any in modern fiction. Though the least typical of the author’s novels, A Tale of Two Cities still underscores many of his enduring themes—imprisonment, injustice, social anarchy, resurrection, and the renunciation that fosters renewal.]]> 489 Charles Dickens 0141439602 Tareq 3 3.86 1859 A Tale of Two Cities
author: Charles Dickens
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1859
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Little Women (Little Women, #1)]]> 1934 This is an alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780451529305.

Generations of readers young and old, male and female, have fallen in love with the March sisters of Louisa May Alcott’s most popular and enduring novel, Little Women. Here are talented tomboy and author-to-be Jo, tragically frail Beth, beautiful Meg, and romantic, spoiled Amy, united in their devotion to each other and their struggles to survive in New England during the Civil War.

It is no secret that Alcott based Little Women on her own early life. While her father, the freethinking reformer and abolitionist Bronson Alcott, hobnobbed with such eminent male authors as Emerson, Thoreau, and Hawthorne, Louisa supported herself and her sisters with "woman’s work,� including sewing, doing laundry, and acting as a domestic servant. But she soon discovered she could make more money writing. Little Women brought her lasting fame and fortune, and far from being the "girl’s book� her publisher requested, it explores such timeless themes as love and death, war and peace, the conflict between personal ambition and family responsibilities, and the clash of cultures between Europe and America.

]]> 449 Louisa May Alcott Tareq 0 to-read 4.16 1868 Little Women (Little Women, #1)
author: Louisa May Alcott
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1868
rating: 0
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]]> Romeo and Juliet 18135 Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare creates a violent world, in which two young people fall in love. It is not simply that their families disapprove; the Montagues and the Capulets are engaged in a blood feud.

In this death-filled setting, the movement from love at first sight to the lovers� final union in death seems almost inevitable. And yet, this play set in an extraordinary world has become the quintessential story of young love. In part because of its exquisite language, it is easy to respond as if it were about all young lovers.]]> 281 William Shakespeare 0743477111 Tareq 3 3.74 1597 Romeo and Juliet
author: William Shakespeare
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.74
book published: 1597
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn]]> 2956 327 Mark Twain 0142437174 Tareq 4 3.82 1884 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
author: Mark Twain
name: Tareq
average rating: 3.82
book published: 1884
rating: 4
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]]> One Hundred Years of Solitude 320 417 Gabriel García Márquez Tareq 5 4.10 1967 One Hundred Years of Solitude
author: Gabriel García Márquez
name: Tareq
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1967
rating: 5
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]]>