Серия "Open Door"

Dr. Christopher Lemuel escapes England on a privateer after he has the misfortune of winning a duel. With his life in jeopardy, he signs on as ship's doctor only to face further dangers on the high seas. The good doctor is wounded in a sea battle, captured by pirates, and reluctantly becomes a buccaneer. Then matters become stranger still when Dr. Lemuel is marooned on an island populated by enormous beasts unknown in natural history.

What do you do when something magical happens…in your own backyard? Linda and Earl are a happy couple. Although married for many years, they have never had children. Still, they are content being together, and watching reruns of “I Love Lucy” keeps them close. That, and a magical garden that never seems to grow what they plant. One day Earl finds a set of infant toes in the loam. He and Linda plant them and watch in amazement as the garden produces an enormous baby. Now Earl and Linda have to...

A woman discovers she has a rogue body part, one she’s never heard of. As she prepares herself for surgery to remove the offense, she travels to London and finds answers to her questions in unexpected places—a locked room in a museum where jars of Victorian body parts are stored, an early 19th century operating room in the attic of a church, and a diary by a woman whose husband dissected a rhinoceros in their flat. Along the way, she ponders the nature of disease, the unfortunate name given to...

Modern travelers on foot follow wisdom along the Ulster Way. Storytellers, said Walter Benjamin, are descended from one of two tribes: the mariners or the peasants. We revel in the stories of the sailors, with their lure of exotic places and the treasures a mariner brings home. We hearken to the stories of the peasants for a glimmer of the past, best revealed to natives and landed people. Brian Bouldrey, professional vagabond, and his very organized friend Garth, two unlikely mariners, hit dry...

Sarah Holloway is a frustrated painter, sketching on the backs of shopping lists and sharing her studio with a washer and dryer. Abandoned by her mother, she has tried to hide her childhood wounds by healing others through art therapy. During her daughter’s first two years, she has faked her way through motherhood with the help of women in her neighborhood playgroup. She hopes she has gotten the hang of it when she learns she is expecting another child. Then, a routine test...

Suddenly driven from their African home by a war in Biafra, the McCall family washes up in a small town in the San Joaquin Valley. The locals assume they must be glad to be back in the "civilized world." But life in America is lonely, desolate and dull, and the children and their  fragile mother hope that one day they will return to the life they left behind. Their father, a hardened oil man, knows better: war has destroyed any home they may have had. As the...

Walace Weiss, A once-famous fantasy novelist, now troubled by drug addiction, sets himself on a final two-fold quest: to finish his first novel in over a decade, and, like the immortal elves of his stories, to try and remember what, in his long life, he should not have forgotten. Part of the prestigious Open Door Series, originally designed for adult literacy in Ireland, these books confirm the truth that a story doesn't have to be big to change our world. The Sorrow of...

What do you do when Fate shows up in your rose bed with three-inch canines and retractable claws Robert–not Bob!–Stevenson wakes up one morning in his Vermont home to find a Bengal tiger sitting in his rose garden. Is the tiger real? Or has the illness that has invaded every other part of Robert's body finally and quite literally gone to his head? Real or imaginary, there is no dismounting once you get on the tiger's back.

Louis's sister, Emily, is blind. She’s also in the marching band, sculpts, and has the biggest bedroom in the house to accommodate her Braille machine. Everyone thinks her accomplishments are extraordinary, and most think that she can do no wrong. The single person who doesn't feel awe–or pity–for her is Louis, who wishes people would just stop comparing them. He wants his own life. Only a family tragedy can begin to bridge the widening gap between brother and sister. Part of the Gemma...

Sam Peterson is your average high school student?until he falls through a portal in time and space and lands in the studio of Leonardo da Vinci. This is worse than algebra! Da Vinci was a futurist. He imagined the airplane, the helicopter, submarine, and more—long before anyone else. Who better to design a time machine to get Sam home? Our time-traveler gets hooked on art and science as he gets to know Leonardo. Meanwhile, da Vinci is fascinated by the common items of 21st century life. Yellow...

The Charles River divides Boston and Cambridge, and the Red Line ties the cities together, traveling through an expanse of class and cultures along its route. When an unlikely combination of riders share an afternoon train, they are surprised to discover what's common in their American experience. Part of the prestigious Open Door Series, originally designed for adult literacy in Ireland, these books confirm the truth that a story doesn't have to be...