Being attributed to Sun Tzu, who was known for having the mentality regarding the war as being an evil ought to be avoided whenever possible, the Art of War started to reveal slowly how a war should be fought. He states the fact that no war comes with advantages, especially if there are economic loses on the both sides (and no war can avoid that by any means). Also, when talking about capturing a town, it should be intact and destroyed only if there is no other way to deal with it. Any other damages are as well, utterly important not to interfere with, and so to be avoided.

Another aspect found in the Art of War has to deal with the strategic position. All the sides of the battle need to start having a logical strategy, and consider the steps before being made.

The Art of War is divided into 13 different chapters, regarding the aspects of the war. The first one, known as ‘Laying Plans’, opens the insights of the story , giving all the necessary details to let you know the information just as it should be taught. Although throughout time there have been made different translations to the book, the collection has the same understanding as a whole. If you are not the kind of person who stays and enjoys a great book, but instead, a movie can do the work for you, then make sure to wait a little bit more until the film based on the Art of War is released.

These being said, whether you are a war lover or a peace one, make sure to get the Art of War knowledge as soon as possible. Even though at the first sight the chapters have to deal only with the war between countries, actually you will slowly get to understand the fact that they can easily apply to the real life as well, between two or more people. In fact, the Art of War is a great knowledge to help you understand the way others see and judge facts, so you should definitely go for it when the right time comes.

Tess is the older daughter of the Durbeyfield, a poor family from Britain of the late 18th century, but who find out at some point that they would be descendants of an aristocratic family, d’Urbervilles. The girl is sent to work at d’ Urbervilles, in hope that they will help her get rich, but not knowing that the name is actually bought, and that this family has nothing to do with the old aristocrats. Life is unfair with the little aristocrat, whose title does not matter. Practically the entire novel revolves around the idea of fatalism. Tess will have to pay not only for the crime committed but also for all the injustices whose victim was.

Tess of the d’Urbervilles is not as easy to read as Far from the Madding Crowd. Remains however, a quite ‘romantic’ testimony of that era, perhaps because the action takes place in cities not so macabre described by Dickens.

Unlike women writers of her period, Eliot did not write conventional romance fictions filled with stereotypical fantasies, but realistic novels. She adopted an obscure tone and refused happy endings. Middlemarch is considered one of the major masterpieces of English fiction.

Plot summary
The novel is not a typical novel, but a set of relationships between several main characters where nobody is in the center of attention. It has multiple plots and many characters, while the action take place in Midlands, a fictitious town of Middlemarch between 1830 and 1832.

Two major life choices rule the action in this novel: marriage and vocation. There are three interwoven narratives till the final third: the marriage of Dorothea with Casaubon, the relationship of Lydgate and Rosamond and the relationship of Fred and Mary. The final thread brings forward Ladislaw and his relationship with Dorothea, recently a widow. In addition to the main stories, there are many other scenes that complete the perspective of the broad underlying themes and life aspects of the book.

The unrealistic ideals are dissected and presented from a realistic point of view. Marriages between incompatible people never reach harmony, while marriages based on compatibility are successful. Marriages in which women have something to say also seem to work better.

The book presents the effects of making the wrong choices both in marriage and profession. Dorothea, for example, suffers from confining to the domestic life, but her ambition to realize a social reform is never fulfilled while Rosamond`s shrewd abilities led her to vanity.

Themes and style
Provincial society is depicted in detail. Eliot`s purpose was to show how complex ordinary human life really is, with all its quiet tragedies, failings, small triumphs and estates of dignity. Throughout the novel, the reader shifts his sympathies – now we feel pity for Casaubon, a moment later we criticize him.

The major themes of Middlemarch are: marriage, social expectations, chance, self-determination, death, gossip, femininity, science, compassion, dreams and hopes.

Plot summary

The story is divided between two settings: Moscow in the 30`s and Jerusalem of Pontius Pilate during the trial of Yeshua Ha-Nozri (Jesus the Nazarene).

The Devil disguised as Professor Woland arrives in Moscow during Holy Week. He is accompanied by four of his assistants: a grotesque valet, a mischievous cat, a hitman and a witch. Their target is the corrupt society reunited in the Moscow`s literary elite, along with its privileged Griboyedov`s House and trade union MASSOLIT.

Woland`s first victim is Berlioz, the unbelieving head of literary bureaucracy. Ivan, a young poet, witnesses the scene, but nobody believes him when he talks about the evil gang. He ends up in a insane asylum where he meets the Master.

Another storyline starts and concerns the Master and his love, Margarita. In her attempt to reunite with the Master, Margarita makes a pact with the Devil and becomes a powerful witch. The pact is made in the Good Friday, when Christ is crucified. Margarita is also the hostess for Devil`s Spring Ball, where all dark celebrities of the history arrive from Hell.

In order to reward her, Satan is ready to make true whatever Margarita wishes for. First she wants to liberate a woman from Hell then she wants the Master to be free and live their life together in poverty. Her wish comes true, but they die then are reawakened. The Devil and his suite leave Moscow in the setting Easter sun. Because they did not lose faith in humanity, the Master and Margarita will spend their eternity together in a peaceful yet shadowy place somewhere between Hell and Heaven – they are too good for the eternal punishment, but too bad for the light of Eden.

Themes and style

The three stories – the Devil`s actions against the unfaithful and corrupted ones, the story of The Master and Margarita and the crucifixion of Jesus Christ – are closely related and characters meet. The story is built on a complex relationship between Moscow and Jerusalem that crosses the time barrier.

This philosophical allegory was influenced a lot by Goethe`s Faust. The main themes are good vs. evil, courage vs. cowardice, innocence vs. guilt and Hell vs. Heaven.

The realistic background of the story is found in the preface, where the author makes us the description of the journalistic newsworthiness that he had to do at a monastery in Colombia. There he witnessed the removal of the earthly remains of a young girl, Sierva Maria de Todos Los Angeles, whose hair was measuring over twenty feet long. Based on this substrate, Marquez developed a story that places it somewhere in the middle of the eighteenth century.

Of Love and Other Demons is written in the most traditional marquezian style, which transforms reality and dresses it in clothing story; it’s a story about a bittersweet love, about abandonment, misunderstanding, about angels and demons.

Written in 1856, Madame Bovary was accused of obscenity by public prosecutors at first, went to trial and became very popular because of the controversial story around it. Despite the notoriety achieved by the scandal, Madame Bovary is one of the most important Realistic and influential novel ever written.

Plot Summary
Emma, a farmer`s daughter, surrounds herself with wild fantasies inspired from the books she read and dreams about a passionate love that will carry her away from the boring provincial life. She marries a doctor, Charles Bovary, but marriage is not as expected for Emma and transforms her from an interesting and vivid young girl into a dull woman. Her reveries start affecting her health, so her husband decides to move from countryside to a larger town, Yonville.

Motherhood is also a disappointment for Emma, so she starts looking for something else. At first she starts a chaste friendship with Leon, an intelligent law student who also returns her admiration, but shame and fear make her remain a faithful wife and mother and hides her love for the young man.

Rudolph, a ruthless playboy, seduces Emma and they start a tawdry affair for three years. Emma lets herself taken by romantic fantasy and starts risking everything by indiscreet letters and visits while dreaming about running away with him. On the other hand, Rodolphe has no such intention and breaks up with her. Emma is shocked, falls ill, then returns to religion.

After she is recovered, she meets Leon again and they begin an affair. Even if at first their love is ecstatic, Leon loses interest in Emma because of her emotional excesses. Emma begins buying expensive items on credit from a crafty merchant. When the merchant calls for the debt, Emma cannot find money and kills herself by swallowing arsenic. Charles, her husband, falls into grief, stops working and worships her dead wife. After he finds the love letters to Leon and Rodolphe, he tries to forgive her by finding all kind of excuses. He loses all his possessions and finally dies.

Themes and style
Some of the themes of the book are: family, adultery, desire, consumerism, fidelity, passion, French rural life, social rules and constraints, suicide and sufferance.

Emma Bovary`s psychological portrait is carefully built and truly captivating. Flaubert`s supporting characters and memorable scenes describing rural French society, along with the language and pattern are great examples of Realism.

The action takes place in one of the poor districts in the city of Viron, located on a world called the Whorl. A priest named Silk is charged by a dark god to save his parish threatened by a mobster. From here starts a series of adventures or rather a chain of accidents more or less controlled by which the young priest begins to discover the truth about the nature of the gods whom the world he lives in, also worship them. Within two days Silk becomes friend with a burglar, enters by burglary in a house, struggles with a huge bird, steals weapons of mass destruction, solves a murder mystery, exorcise a brothel and so on.

All these events are narrated with humor and brevity. The book begins a little difficult, like any journey into an unknown land, but then it becomes impossible to be let out of hand. All pleasure is to put together the clues and solve the puzzle. So go and read the Nightside of the Long Sun now.

Plot Summary

To the Lighthouse has three sections – “The Window”, “Time Passes”, and ‘The Lighthouse” – and focuses on the Ramsay family and their stay on the Isle of Skye, at their summer home.
The novel starts with Mrs. Ramsay planning a visit to the lighthouse for his family and their guests. Mr. Ramsay says the weather will be unclear, so there will be no trip. This lead to a tension between them and the incident is many times referred to later when it`s about their relationship.

Lily Briscoe is a young painter who wants to make the portrait of Mrs. Ramsay and James, her son. She does not finish the portrait and in addition she is affected by another guest`s remarks that women cannot paint of write. “The Window” section finishes with a large dinner party perturbed by some incidents. “Time Passes” presents what happened the next ten years: Mrs. Ramsay and other characters die.

The last section of To the Lighthouse finds the remaining Ramsay and their friends in the same summer home, but ten years after the reunion from the beginning of the novel. Mr. Ramsay is decided to take the trip to the lighthouse with his two children. On their way there, Mr. Ramsay manages to establish a moment of empathy with James and even Cam, his daughter, changes her feeling for Mr. Ramsay from resentment to a certain admiration.

Meanwhile, Lily tries to finish the painting she has started at the beginning. Based on her memories of Mr. and Mrs. Ramsay, she completes it, but realizes that executing her own vision is more important to her that leaving her work as a legacy.

Themes and style

The novel mainly presents the different approached to life of the characters. The main themes are the transience of life and work, art as a way of preservation and reality as a subjective perception. There are also many symbols in the novel such as the lighthouse, the painting, the sea and the summer house.

In writing the book, Tolstoy got inspired also from his military experience as he served in the Crimean War. The novel is a historical fiction, but Tolstoy made it more than that by developing his own views of history and the interconnection between events and individuals. In addition, the narrative structure and the variety and psychological analysis are mastery built while the visual details are evocative and dramatic.

Plot summary
The epic tale War and Peace is a massive novel that makes the chronicle of the tumultuous historical events happened during the French invasion of Russia, at the beginning of the 19th century, within the Napoleonic wars. With a large cast of characters, including real historical personalities, the book actually focuses on five aristocratic families, particularly the Bezukhovs, the Bolkonskys, and the Rostovs, in the context of the impact the Napoleonic era had on the Tsarist society and aristocracy.

The story begins at a party where most of the main characters and families are introduced as they enter the salon. Each family has its own issues, intrigues and hidden secrets. As war begins, men go to war and the experience they have on the battlefield completely changes their lives. Aristocratic families have to face ruin and denigration. There are love affairs, duels, infidelities, ambitions, disillusions, military dramas, family dramas, religious issues, obsessions, treason’s and assassinates.

Themes and style
The theme of war is in fact subordinate to the story of family existence. The search for the meaning of life is another important theme of the book, as well as the limits of leadership and the irrationality of human motives. Other themes and motifs are: love, financial loss, death, war, family, relationships and Russian aristocracy. Luxurious details are combined with amazing breaking into the narrative by introducing historical essays.

The book comes from a seven-article series, “The Harvest Gypsies”, the author wrote on migrant workers during the Great Depression. When it was published, The Grapes of Wrath generated a lot of controversy, as it was banned and burned, but heavily read.

Plot Summary
The Grapes of Wrath is focused on the story of the Joads, a poor family looking for a making a living during the harsh years of the Great Depression. Recently released from jail, Tom Joad meets Jim Casy on his way back home and they become friends. As they arrive at Joad`s house, they find it empty because the family was staying at an uncle`s after crops were destroyed by the drought and the farm taken by the bank.

The only solution appears to be going to fruitful California. The family begins a long and hazardous trip to California. On their way they meet many other families driven by the same promise, but there are also stories of the ones coming back from California where it appears that things are not so as expected. The Joads have no choice but to continue their journey because they have nothing left back in Oklahoma.

Once arrived in California, they realize there is an oversupply of workers compared with the little work there is to do. In addition to the lack of work, the family is treated with no respect even by the other migrants. Even if they get work at several farms, they cannot earn enough money to survive. There are also other complications such as Tom becoming a fugitive after killing Casy`s murderer.

To make things worse, a flood happens near the end of the harvest season and makes workers seek for higher ground. The Joads find shelter on a farm. The novel ends with the scene in which Rose of Sharon, who had a stillborn child, breast-feeds a sick man who cannot eat solid food due to starvation.

Themes

The message of the book is that no matter the problems, a family surpasses anything by sticking together. The main themes are the saving power of family and fellowship, as well as man`s inhumanity to man, the dignity of wrath, the effects of altruism and selfishness.