Ocean State Libraries

A foundling of mysterious parentage brought up by Mr. Allworthy on his country estate, Tom Jones is deeply in love with the seemingly unattainable Sophia Western, the beautiful daughter of the neighboring squire--though he sometimes succumbs to the charms of the local girls. When Tom is banished to make his own fortune and Sophia follows him to London to escape an arranged marriage, the adventure begins. A vivid Hogarthian panorama of eighteenth-century...

This novel recounts the unconventional exploits of a man who preferred to change jobs constantly in an age of specialization.

The unforgettable story of a housepainter turned doctor in Big Sky country who finds himself on a darkly funny journey to salvation in this “irrepressibly comic and optimistic” novel (The New York Times Book Review) from the acclaimed author of Ninety-two in the Shade and Cloudbursts
Berl Pickett is living in the small town of Livingston, Montana. The son of Pentecostal rug-shampooers, Pickett has never...

This critical interpretation of the origins of modern fiction follows the transformation of the picaresque novel over four centuries through the literature of Spain, France, England, Germany, Russia, and the United States. Blackburn uses for the first time the resources of myth criticism to demonstrate how the picaresque masterpieces of the Spanish Golden Age founded a narrative structure that was continued by Defoe, Smollett, Melville, Twain, and...

“Erotic and absorbing…Written with startling power.”—The New York Times Book Review
 
Nan King, an oyster girl, is captivated by the music hall phenomenon Kitty Butler, a male impersonator extraordinaire treading the boards in Canterbury. Through a friend at the box office, Nan manages to visit all her shows and finally meet her heroine. Soon after, she becomes Kitty's dresser and the two head for...

"Story of a Greek workman who accompanies the narrator to Crete to work a lignite mine and becomes the narrator's greatest friend and inspiration."--Back cover.

A deeply moving, tragicomic adventure about a boy who escapes his small town in a stolen library on wheels in search of freedom, friendship, and, most of all, family.

Peter Gregory, a 35-year-old high school English teacher with an ex-wife and kids, tries to drown himself in the Ohio River. Failing to manage even that, he decides to hitch a ride east, fleeing the state and escaping accusations of rape and murder. As he assumes and discards aliases along the way, he believes that he can begin again, a fresh start-but the past has a habit of catching up with all of us, no matter how fast we run.