Cranston Public Library

When a doubting young boy takes an extraordinary train ride to the North Pole, he embarks on a journey of self-discovery that shows him that the wonder of life never fades for those who believe.

In 1940s Indiana, nine-year-old Ralphie dreams of his ideal Christmas gift: a genuine Red Ryder 200-shot carbine action air rifle. But when gruff dad and doting mom regularly respond with "You'll shoot your eye out!" Ralphie mounts a full-scale Santa-begging campaign. He encounters a slew of calamities from snowsuit paralysis to the dreaded tongue-on-a-frozen-flagpole gambit.

"In a large country house in Derbyshire in April 1809 sit Lady Thomasina Coverly, aged thirteen, and her tutor, Septimus Hodge. Through the window may be seen some of the '500 acres inclusive of lake' where Capability Brown's idealized landscape is about to give way to the 'picturesque' Gothic style: 'everything but vampires', as the garden historian Hannah Jarvis remarks to Bernard Nightingale when they stand in the same room 180 years later. Bernard...

Rhymed text and illustrations introduce the many meanings of "up."

Donald Robert Perry Marquis (July 29, 1878 – December 29, 1937) was an American humorist, journalist, and author. He was variously a novelist, poet, newspaper columnist, and playwright. He is remembered best for creating the characters Archy and Mehitabel, supposed authors of humorous verse. During his lifetime he was equally famous for creating another fictitious character, "the Old Soak," who was the subject of two books, a hit Broadway play (1922–23),...

George Orwell's famous satire of the Soviet Union, in which "all animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others." A satire on totalitarianism in which farm animals overthrow their human owner and set up their own government.

A Kind of Alaska: A woman awakes after twenty nine years in a coma induced by sleeping sickness. 1 man, 2 women, 1 interior. Victoria Station: Humorous exchange between a lost taxi driver and a dispatcher. 2 men, 1 setting. Family Voices: A radio play. Unrelated voices of a mother, father, and son reflect the complexity of familial relationships. 2 men, 1 woman, 1 setting.

Past, present and future collide on a snowy Christmas Eve for a troubled family of five.

The Water Engine is a story of a poor young factory worker who invents an engine that runs on water. Big business tries to force him to sell the rights. Mr. Happiness is a companion piece where a host of a radio show attempts to help his listeners in their personal problems.

White lies takes place in a fortune-teller's parlor at a rundown seaside resort on the south coast of England. Black comedy takes place at a young sculptor's flat in South Kensington, London.