Item category 1: Classics

CATCH-22 exposes the absurdity of war by applying its own demented logic to America's involvement in Korea. The 'catch' is that soldiers have to claim to be mad in order to get out of fighting - but being capable of making such a claim automatically proves them sane.

On a trip to the South of France, the shy heroine of Rebecca falls in love with Maxim de Winter, a handsome widower. Although his proposal comes as a surprise, she happily agrees to marry him. But as they arrive at her husband's home, Manderley, a change comes over Maxim, and the young bride is f...

'White Nights' comprises a poignant tale of love and loneliness from one of Russia's foremost writers.

The narrator of this tale travels though time and space in a search of ultimate truth. This pilgrimage 'East' covers both real and imaginary lands and takes place not only in our time but in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance too.

Jean Blomart, privileged bourgeois turned patriot leader against the Nazi occupation, waits through the night for his lover to die. Flashbacks interweave the stories of both their lives until, with dawn approaching, Jean faces a monumental decision.

With the Second World War only a few years in the past, and Japan still reeling from its effects, two sisters - born to the same father but different mothers - struggle to make sense of the new world in which they are coming of age. Asako, the younger, has become obsessed with locating a third si...