Jack Murnighan

If you're like most folks, you probably feel guilty for never reading War and Peace, Ulysses, or Moby-Dick. Or maybe you read them in school, but you didn't exactly enjoy them, right? Writer and professor Jack Murnighan says it's not the books that put you off, it was the lifeless, uninspiring way they're usually taught. Now, with Beowulf on the Beach, you'll discover not only why these classics deserve another chance, but how to read great books in general. Balancing humor and expertise, Murnighan picks 50 of the most revered books of all time and explains what the professors never told you: that Moby-Dick is funny, Dante will make you cry, Anna Karenina is a beach read, and James Joyce is great, but only if he's talking about drinking, sex, or organ meats. Plus you get the juicy tidbits on what you're supposed to know, what you need to know, and what's okay for you to skip without feeling guilt. From Homer and Proust to Beloved and the Bible, Beowulf on the Beach is a user-friendly guide through the imposing world of capital-L Literature. In no time at all, you'll be revved up and ready to tackle Dickens or Woolf—only this time without the test.

What to Love and what to Skip in Literature's 50 Greatest Hits

Beowulf on the Beach

Maura Kelly

“A treat for any book lover, happily mated or cheerfully single” (USA TODAY)—two popular journalists give hilarious relationship advice borrowed from the most famous characters in literature. Finding love should be easier than ever before, given all the freedoms we enjoy. But as it turns out, the more options we have, the more difficult attaining romantic bliss becomes. We wonder: Should we put all our energy into online dating, or hang out in bars to find someone new? Should we settle for a friendship-with-benefits, or refuse to stop looking until we happen upon true love? And if we do manage to achieve the impossible and find a perfect match—soul mate, sexual dynamo, and best buddy all in one—how can we beat the relationship doldrums when they come, as they’re bound to in this hyperactive society? In our quest to reach romantic nirvana, we turn to self-help manuals, magazines, talk shows, friends, relatives, and shrinks. But we’ve overlooked the true font of wisdom: the timeless stories written by great novelists. That’s where Much Ado About Loving comes in. In its pages, two book lovers who are also advice columnists—Maura Kelly and Jack Murnighan—relay the lessons in life and love that they’ve learned from reading more classic novels than your English teacher, while having far more romantic conundrums than all of Jane Austen’s characters combined. They’ve done the heavy reading—and the recovering from heartbreak—for you. Now all you need is this book.

What Our Favorite Novels Can Teach You About Date Expectations, Not So-Great Gatsbys, and Love in the Time of Internet Personals

Much Ado About Loving

The literary education you've always lusted for. Fresh from the virtual pages of Nerve.com comes this collection of "naughty bits," an irreverent look into the steamy, scandalous side of literature past and present. With bite-sized salacious excerpts from the classics -- new and old -- each with a fresh, insightful introduction, The Naughty Bits presents the world's great books as you never thought you'd see them. Includes naughty bits by: Dante D. H. Lawrence Philip Roth Goethe Toni Morrison Julio Cortázar John Cheever William Shakespeare Thaddeus Rutkowski John Donne Thomas Malory Günter Grass Herman Melville John Barth Ernest Hemingway Erica Jong Thomas Carew M. F. K. Fisher William Kennedy Jeanette Winterson Paul West Harry Mathews Catullus Clarice Lispector Giovanni Boccaccio James Baldwin Nicholson Baker Tom Wolfe John Wilmot Kevin Canty Plato James Joyce Lydia Davis François Rabelais Kenneth Starr Henry Miller John Updike Geoffrey Chaucer Marquis de Sade Sir Philip Sidney Holly Hughes Martin Amis Andrew Marvell The Pearl Poet Thomas Pynchon Sappho William Gibson Mark Leyner Margery Kempe Jean Genet Edmund Spenser John Cleland Kurt Vonnegut Anaïs Nin Petronius Keith Banner Umberto Eco J. G. Ballard Mario Vargas Llosa Ovid Jean de Meun Catherine Breillat George Eliot Kenzaburo Oe Cormac McCarthy Larry Flynt Rupert Brooke The Old Testament

The Steamiest and Most Scandalous Sex Scenes from the World's Great Books

The Naughty Bits

Shares a cornucopia of whimsical relationship advice borrowed from famous literary characters from Dido to Jane Eyre, revealing what their classical foibles, misadventures and eventual triumphs can teach modern-world victims of the dating scene. Co-written by the author of The Naughty Bits. Reprint.

Jack Murnighan

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