'Around the World in Eighty Days' (1873) relates the hair-raising journey made as a wager by the Victorian gentleman Phileas Fogg, who succeeds - but only just! - in circling the globe within 80 days. The dour Fogg's obsession with his timetable is complemented by the dynamism and versatility of his French manservant, Passepartout, whose talent for getting into scrapes brings colour and suspense to the race against time. 'Five Weeks in a Balloon' (1863) was Verne's first novel. It documents an apocryphal jaunt across the continent of Africa in a hydrogen balloon designed by the omniscient, imperturbable and ever capable Dr Fergusson, the prototype of the Vernian adventurer. 384pp. Paperback.

All of your favourite Beatrix Potter stories are available in two volumes. Volume two code 73729. Volume one contains The Tale of Peter Rabbit, The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin, The Tailor of Gloucester, The Tale of Benjamin Bunny, The Tale of Two Bad Mice, The Tale of the Pie and the Patty Pan, The Tale of Mr Jeremy Fisher, The Story of A Fierce Bad Rabbit, The Story of Miss Moppet, The Tale of Tom Kitten, The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck, The Tale of Pigling Bland and Appley Dapply's Nursery Rhymes. 412 page paperback with beautiful b/w line art illustrations throughout.

All of your favourite Beatrix Potter stories are available in two volumes. Volume one code 73728. Volume two contains The Tale of Mrs Tiggy-Winkle, The Tale of Samuel Whiskers or The Roly-Poly Pudding, The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies, The Tale of Ginger and Pickles, The Tale of Mrs Tittlemouse, The Tale of Timmy Tiptoes, The Tale of Mr Tod, The Tale of Johnny Town-Mouse, The Tale of Little Pig Robinson and Cecily Parsley's Nursery Rhymes. 430 page paperback with beautiful b/w illustrations throughout.

An invaluable companion to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Life on the Mississippi is Mark Twain's inimitable portrait of 'the great Father of Waters'. Part memoir, part travelogue, it expresses the full range of Twain's literary personality, and remains the most vivid, boisterous and provocative account of the cultural and societal history of the Mississippi Valley, from 'the golden age' of steamboating to the violence wrought by the Civil War. This new edition of Life on the Mississippi contains a comprehensive introduction, extensive annotations and a guide to further reading designed to appeal to both the student and the general reader. 412 page paperback. New from Wordsworth.

This novel traces the private lives of a group of people caught up in the cataclysm of the French Revolution and the Terror. Dickens based his historical detail on Carlyle's The French Revolution, and his own observations and investigations during his numerous visits to Paris. 320pp. Paperback.

A full cast of delectable characters that range from the iniquitous Wackford Squeers and his family, to the delightful Mrs Nickelby, taking in the eccentric Crummles and his travelling players, the Mantalinis, the Kenwigs and many more. So great was its impact as it left Dickens' pen that many pirated versions appeared in print and on stage before the original was even finished. Nicholas Nickleby has never ceased to delight readers and is widely regarded as one of the greatest comic masterpieces of 19th century literature. 752pp. Paperback.

Like George Orwell, Franz Kafka has given his name to a world of nightmare, but in Kafka's world, it is never completely clear just what the nightmare is. The Trial, where the rules are hidden from even the highest officials, and if there is any help to be had, it will come from unexpected sources, is a chilling, blackly amusing tale that maintains, to the very end, a relentless atmosphere of disorientation. Superficially about bureaucracy, it is in the last resort a description of the absurdity of 'normal' human nature. Still more enigmatic is The Castle. Is it an allegory of a quasi-feudal system giving way to a new freedom for the subject? The search by a central European Jew for acceptance into a dominant culture? A spiritual quest for grace or salvation? An individual's struggle between his sense of independence and his need for approval? Is it all of these things? And K? Is he opportunist, victim, or an outsider battling against elusive authority? Finally, in his fables, Kafka deals in dark and quirkily humorous terms with the insoluble dilemmas of a world which offers no reassurance, and no reliable guidance to resolving our existential and emotional uncertainties and anxieties. Translated and with an Introduction by John R. Williams. 614 page paperback.

Homer's great epic describes the many adventures of Odysseus, Greek warrior, as he strives over many years to return to his home island of Ithaca after the Trojan War. Odysseus's quick-witted heroism, his colourful adventures, his endurance, his love for his wife and son have the same power to move and inspire readers today as they did in Archaic Greece, 2,800 years ago. This poem has been translated many times over the years, but Chapman's sinewy, gorgeous rendering (1616) stands in a class of its own. Chapman believed himself inspired by the spirit of Homer and matches the breadth and power of the original with a complex and stunning idiom of his own. John Keats expressed his admiration for the resulting work in the famous sonnet On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer: 'Much have I travelled in the realms of gold…' This new Wordsworth edition of Chapman's Homer contains accessible annotation and a detailed introduction that places his masterpiece in the context of his own day and discusses its influence on later poets. 512 page paperback.

Trollope paints a picture as panoramic as his title promises, of the life of 1870s London, the loves of those drawn to and through the city, and the career of Augustus Melmotte. Melmotte is one of the Victorian novel’s greatest and strangest creations, and 'The Way We Live Now' is an achievement undimmed by the passage of time. Trollope's 'Now' might, in the twenty-first century, look like some distant disenchanted 'Then', but this is still the yesterday which we must understand in order to make proper sense of our today. 784pp. Paperback.

Set in the mid-19th century, and written from the author's first-hand experience, North and South follows the story of the heroine's movement from the tranquil but moribund ways of southern England to the vital but turbulent north. Elizabeth Gaskell's skilful narrative uses an unusual love story to show how personal and public lives were woven together in a newly industrial society. This is a tale of hard-won triumphs - of rational thought over prejudice and of humane care over blind deference to the market. Readers in the twenty-first century will find themselves absorbed as this Victorian novel traces the origins of problems and possibilities which are still challenging a hundred and fifty years later: the complex relationships, public and private, between men and women of different classes. 416pp. Paperback.