Every Friday, Marilyn Knapp Litt, who blogs at ClassicKindle.com, brings us her recommendation of a free classic book to discover (or rediscover) on Kindle. Find more of Marilyn’s recommendations at her blog, ClassicKindle.com, a guide to the best free and inexpensive classic literature for the Kindle. You can also get Marilyn’s blog on Kindle and I recommend that you “Like” the Classic Kindle Facebook page as well so you don’t miss anything. Here’s Marilyn’s post:

Elizabeth and Her German Garden by Elizabeth von Arnim is an 1898 novel. Although this is a novel, it follows the author’s life in she also was an English woman who married a German Count.

I love this comment from a review on Amazon UK from one of the reader reviewers: “Anyone who delights in communing with the earth in their own little corner of half-tamed nature, whilst blithely ignoring the pressures of family and day-to-day life, will find a kindred spirit in Elizabeth.”

Of course careful watchers of the wonderful “Downton Abbey” on PBS will recognize this title as the one Mr. Mosely presses on Anna as a pretext for talking with her. Of course any tie to Downton must be interesting and this book was a best seller in its day. Remember books could be bestsellers for decades in the pre-copyright era.

So let’s take a look inside:

Luckily I had sown two great patches of sweetpeas which made me very happy all the summer, and then there were some sunflowers and a few hollyhocks under the south windows, with Madonna lilies in between. But the lilies, after being transplanted, disappeared to my great dismay, for how was I to know it was the way of lilies? And the hollyhocks turned out to be rather ugly colours, so that my first summer was decorated and beautified solely by sweet-peas. At present we are only just beginning to breathe after the bustle of getting new beds and borders and paths made in time for this summer. The eleven beds round the sun-dial are filled with roses, but I see already that I have made mistakes with some. As I have not a living soul with whom to hold communion on this or indeed on any matter, my only way of learning is by making mistakes.

But it is not all gardens. One of her children insists on a Bible story:

I began about Adam and Eve, with an eye to future parsonic probings. The April baby’s eyes opened wider and wider, and her face grew redder and redder. I was surprised at the breathless interest she took in the story—the other two were tearing up tufts of grass and hardly listening. I had scarcely got to the angels with the flaming swords and announced that that was all, when she burst out, “Now I’ll tell about it. Once upon a time there was Adam and Eva, and they had plenty of clothes, and there was no snake, and lieber Gott wasn’t angry with them, and they could eat as many apples as they liked, and was happy for ever and ever—there now!”

I can see this would have been the sort of book read upstairs and downstairs.

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Every Friday, Marilyn Knapp Litt, who blogs at ClassicKindle.com, brings us her recommendation of a free classic book to discover (or rediscover) on Kindle. Find more of Marilyn’s recommendations at her blog, ClassicKindle.com, a guide to the best free and inexpensive classic literature for the Kindle. You can also get Marilyn’s blog on Kindle and I recommend that you “Like” the Classic Kindle Facebook page as well so you don’t miss anything. Here’s Marilyn’s post:

Western readers know Frederick Faust who wrote under the pen name Max Brand. What they may not know is Faust was a war correspondent killed in Italy by shrapnel during WWII.

Unlike other Western writers who place their cowboys before the “decline” of the West, Brands characters in Way of the Lawless (1921) confront the new world head on:

Pat Gregg was leaving the saloon; he was on his horse, but he sat the saddle slanting, and his head was turned to give the farewell word to several figures who bulged through the door of the saloon. For that reason, as well as because of the fumes in his brain, he did not hear the coming of the automobile. His friends from the saloon yelled a warning, but he evidently thought it some jest, as he waved his hand with a grin of appreciation. The big car was coming, rocking with its speed; it was too late now to stop that flying mass of metal.

But not everything has changed:

“Be on your way, Buck. Get out of town, and get out of trouble. My boy hears you been talkin’ about him, and he allows as how he’ll get you. He’s out for you now.”

The fumes cleared sufficiently from Buck Heath’s mind to allow him to remember that Jasper Lanning’s boy was no other than the milk-blooded Andy. He told Jasper to lead his boy on. There was a reception committee waiting for him there in the person of one Buck Heath.

“Don’t be a fool, Buck,” said Jasper, glancing over his shoulder. “Don’t you know that Andy’s a crazy, man-killin’ fool when he gets started? And he’s out for blood now. You just slide out of town and come back when his blood’s cooled down.”

Buck Heath took another drink from the bottle in his pocket, and then regarded Jasper moodily. “Partner,” he declared gloomily, putting his hand on the shoulder of Jasper, “maybe Andy’s a man-eater, but I’m a regular Andy-eater, and here’s the place where I go and get my feed. Lemme loose!”

Don’t you want to know what happens? Kick up your boots and sit a spell with Max Brand.

Click here to get your free copy of Way of the Lawless by Max Brand >>>

Every Friday, Marilyn Knapp Litt, who blogs at ClassicKindle.com, brings us her recommendation of a free classic book to discover (or rediscover) on Kindle. Find more of Marilyn’s recommendations at her blog, ClassicKindle.com, a guide to the best free and inexpensive classic literature for the Kindle. You can also get Marilyn’s blog on Kindle and I recommend that you “Like” the Classic Kindle Facebook page as well so you don’t miss anything. Here’s Marilyn’s post:

The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane was published in 1895. Casual readers sometimes think because this is an old book, it dates back to the Civil War. But the author was not a soldier and not even born at that time of the conflict.

The novel, which is much respected, is an early psychological novel, following the protagonist’s interior war with himself. Here he is on the (possible) eve of battle.

A little panic-fear grew in his mind. As his imagination went forward to a fight, he saw hideous possibilities. He contemplated the lurking menaces of the future, and failed in an effort to see himself standing stoutly in the midst of them. He recalled his visions of broken-bladed glory, but in the shadow of the impending tumult he suspected them to be impossible pictures.

He sprang from the bunk and began to pace nervously to and fro. “Good Lord, what’s th’ matter with me?” he said aloud.

He felt that in this crisis his laws of life were useless. Whatever he had learned of himself was here of no avail. He was an unknown quantity. He saw that he would again be obliged to experiment as he had in early youth. He must accumulate information of himself, and meanwhile he resolved to remain close upon his guard lest those qualities of which he knew nothing should everlastingly disgrace him. “Good Lord!” he repeated in dismay.

I think the writing is deliberately spare and the characters ciphers, so they can stand in for any time, any war, anyone.

His emotions made him feel strange in the presence of men who talked excitedly of a prospective battle as of a drama they were about to witness, with nothing but eagerness and curiosity apparent in their faces. It was often that he suspected them to be liars.

From Pickett’s Charge, to Utah Beach, to Kandahar – some things never change.

To all the former soldiers reading this, “Welcome Home!”

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